DAVID 
LIVINGSTONE 



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CSILYESTER 
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DAVID LIVINGSTONE 




DAVID LIVINGSTONEt 



DAVID LIVINGSTONE 



BY 

C. SILVESTER HORNE, M.P, 



WITH ILLUSTRATIONS 



53'^m f 0rfe 
THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 

1916 



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MACMILLAN AND CO., Limited 

LONDON . BOMBAY . CALCUTTA 
MELBOURNE 

THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 

NEW YORK . BOSTON . CHICAGO 
DALLAS . SAN FRANCISCO 

THE MACMILLAN CO. OF CANADA, Ltd, 

TORONTO 



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All lights reserved 



PREFACE 

On March 19th, 191 3, a hundred years will have 
passed since David Livingstone was born. It is 
only forty years since his body was carried by 
faithful hands from the centre of Africa to the 
coast that he might be buried among his peers in 
Westminster Abbey. In those forty years great 
and astounding changes have been witnessed in 
the Continent which is associated with his fame. 
The campaign he fought against the slave-system 
that desolated the vast district drained by the 
Zambesi had to be renewed to free the population 
on the banks of the Congo. Southern Africa has 
been reconstructed and consolidated. The Upper 
and the Lower Nile have witnessed many strange 
vicissitudes of history. Other names have 
become great in men's mouths. Some have been 
associated with vast political enterprises ; while 
some, with a disinterestedness as noble as Living- 
stone's, have been at once the pioneers and the 
martyrs of a Christian civilisation. But nothing 
that has happened since has diminished by a single 

V 



VI 



PREFACE 



laurel the wreath he won, and will wear for ever. 
With every decade his fame greatens ; and what- 
ever our views on African problems may be, we 
may all agree that her white population may well 
pray for a double portion of his spirit. At first it 
seemed unnecessary to re-write his life. The task 
has been so well fulfilled by many sympathetic 
biographers. For anyone who has the patience 
and the leisure it is to he found recorded in the 
fascinating pages of his journals. But it is so 
great a possession that there seemed to be room 
for yet another attempt to present it to those in 
our busy century who ask for short measure and a 
clear, simple narrative of facts. This is what the 
present biography aspires to be. The author has 
aimed not so much at telling the story as at 
allowing the story to tell itself It may be added 
that, in the belief of the writer, Livingstone is 
greatest, not as a scientist, nor an explorer, but as a 
man and a missionary. 



CONTENTS 

PAGE 

Chapter I . . i 

Chapter ^ 11 ......... 22 

Chapter III 54 

Chapter IV . . . . . . . . .66 

Chapter V 85 

Chapter VI '106 

Chapter VII 138 

Chapter VIII . . . • 165 

Chapter IX 179 

Chapter X 191 

Chapter XI— -Characteristics • . . . 229 

lND£X ........ 245 



PAGE 

DAVID LIVINGSTONE Frontispiece 



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 

y 

THE CLYDE AND RUINS OF THE OLD MILL AT . 

BLANTVRE 1 3 

WHERE LIVINGSTONE LIVED AT ONGAR . . • I3 "^ 

LIVINGSTONE ATTACKED BY A LION . • . , 32 / 

PREACHING ON THE JOURNEY UP-COUNTRY . . "J^ J 

THE TRAGEDY OF CENTRAL AFRICA . . . . 161 . 

" I READ THE BIBLE THROUGH FOUR TIMES WHILST 

I WAS IN MANYUEMA " 169 

THE MANYUEMA AMBUSCADE 1 75 

STANLEY FINDS LIVINGSTONE 181 

ON THE LAST MARCH . . . . . . . 211 ^ 

CARRYING THE BODY TO THE SEA .... 223 

MAP OF LIVINGSTONE'S JOURNEYS IN AFRICA . At end 



DR. LIVINGSTONE 

CHAPTER I 

The year 1813 in which my story 
opens was a momentous one in the 
history of Europe. The titanic struggle 
with Napoleon was nearing its crisis. 
Victor at Lutzen and Bautzen, he had been 
defeated at Leipzig, on one of the bloodiest 
battlefields in modern warfare. Away in 
the Pyrenees, Wellington was grappling 
with Soult, and step by step driving him 
back on to French soil. Among those who 
were fighting in the ranks of the British 
army were at least two men bearing the 
name of Livingstone. It is doubtful 
whether they even heard, amid the excite- 
ment and peril of the time, that away in 
peaceful far Blantyre, and in their brother 



2 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap, 

NeiVs home, a lad had been born, and 
christened by the good, sound scriptural 
name of David. Yet it may come to be 
believed some day that the birth of David 
Livingstone was of more vital influence 
upon the destiny of the world even than the 
battle in which Napoleon s star set in blood 
two years later. For to open up a continent, 
and lead the way in the Christianisation of 
its countless millions was one of the '' more 
renowned " victories of peace — a more 
difficult and notable achievement than to 
overthrow one form of military domination 
in Europe. 

The family of Livingstones or Livingstons 
— for David Livingstone himself spelt his 
name for many years without the final *' e " — 
came from the Island of Ulva off the coast 
of Argyllshire. Not much of interest is 
known about them except that one of them 
died at Culloden fighting for the Stuarts ; so 
that the ** fighting blood " in their veins had 
its way with them before Davids more 
immediate kinsmen crossed the seas to the 
Peninsula. The most distinguished member 



I DR. LIVINGSTONE 3 

of the family inherited the Highlander's 
daring and love of exploits combined with 
the most pacific spirit, and left behind him 
an unstained record as an explorer who 
never lifted his hand to do hurt to anyone 
through all the perils of his adventurous 
career. Towards the close of the eighteenth 
century his grandfather had crossed from 
Ulva and settled in Blantyre, a village on 
the Clyde that had certainly no romantic 
attraction. He was employed in a cotton 
factory there. Most of his sons went off to 
the wars ; but one of them, Neil, settled in 
Blantyre as a dealer in tea. He had been 
previously apprenticed to David Hunter, a 
tailor ; and, as many a good apprentice has 
done before him, married his masters 
daughter. Neil Livingstone and his brave 
wife had a hard fight of it to make a living 
out of a small tea business, and to educate 
and rear their children. Two of the 
children died in infancy ; but three sons and 
two daughters grew up in that humble home. 
David was the second son. He was born 
on March 19th, 18 13. 



4 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

The small struggling tradesman has had 
little justice done to him either by the 
novelist or by common repute. He is 
usually represented as a man who cannot 
afford to keep a soul, and whose interests are 
limited to sordid and petty transactions 
across a counter, not always nor often of a 
scrupulous and honourable character. The 
reputation is very ill-deserved. The small 
shop has proved itself as good a training 
ground as any other for scholars, and saints 
and heroes ; and, but for the fact that our 
prejudices die hard, we should recognise that 
it is so. Neil Livingstone and his wife may 
have lived a narrow life, serving faithfully 
their customers and dividing their interests 
between their family, their business, and the 
little Independent Chapel of which Neil 
Livingstone was a Deacon. But they found 
their sphere large enough for the practice of 
the fundamental Christian virtues, as well as 
for the noblest of all interests — the interest 
in the progress of the Kingdom of God 
throughout the world. There was one 
family tradition of which David Livingstone 



I DR. LIVINGSTONE 5 

was immensely proud. A saying had come 
down to them attributed to an ancestor that 
in all the family history there was no record 
of any dishonest man. When Deacon Neil 
Livingstone and his wife had passed away, 
the epitaph on their grave recorded the 
gratitude of their children for **poor and 
honest parents." In this simple and public 
fashion they expressed their thanks for the 
honesty of one who, when he sold a pound of 
tea, gave neither short weight, nor an 
adulterated article. They also gave thanks 
for the poverty of their parents, recognising 
in poverty one of those hard but kind 
necessities that make for industry and 
courage and patience ; and that the children 
of the poor oftener leave the world their 
debtor for serviceable activities than the 
children of the well-to-do, who have less 
spur to their ambitions. It was eminently 
characteristic of David Livingstone that he 
should thus avow his thanks for the honesty 
and poverty of his father and mother. 
There are those still living who recall the 
manly pride with which he was wont to 



6 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

refer to ** my own order, the honest 
poor." 

The mother of David Livingstone was a 
woman of great charm and force of character 
— *' a delicate little woman, with a wonder- 
ful flow of good spirits." In her, rare 
devoutness and sterling common sense were 
combined. She was the careful and thrifty 
housewife, who had to make every sixpence 
go as far as possible ; but she was re- 
membered for her unfailing cheerfulness and 
serenity, and there was always something to 
be saved out of the meagre income when the 
work of the Church of Christ needed extra 
support. She came of Covenanting stock, 
and her father, David Hunter, the tailor, 
received his first religious impressions at an 
open-air service, held while the snow was 
falling fast, and used to tell that so absorbed 
was he in the realisation of the truth of the 
Gospel, that, though before the end of 
the sermon the snow was ankle-deep, he had 
no sensation of cold. He lived to be eighty- 
seven, was a close and prolific reader, bore 
severe reverses of fortune with unflinching 



I DR. LIVINGSTONE 7 

courage, and earned the high respect of the 
countryside. 

It is impossible to exaggerate what David 
Livingstone owed to the stock from which 
he sprang and the bracing influences of his 
early environment. There were two draw- 
backs to his home education. It seems that 
the Deacon had put two classes of book on 
his private index expurgatorius, as being 
dangerous — novels, and books of science. 
So far as novels are concerned the harm 
done was probably slight ; for no one is well- 
read in the Bible and the Pilgrim s Progress 
without receiving a liberal education, and 
the cultivation of the imagination ; while 
history, biography, books of travel, and 
missionary records amply served the same 
purpose. But the proscription of books of 
science was an evidence of the old evil 
creed that there is essential antagonism 
between science and religion. This 
assumption came near to doing David 
permanent injury. His religious difficulties 
did not disappear until in his own words 
** having lighted on those admirable works 



8 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

of Dr. Thomas Dick, * The Philosophy of 
Religion/ and * The Philosophy of a Future 
State ' it was gratifying to find that he had 
enforced my own conviction that religion and 
science were friendly to one another.'' Few 
people in the nineteenth century were 
destined to do more towards the practical 
reconciliation of science and religion than 
David Livingstone. 

It is interesting to find that even in his 
very young days he had a mind and will of 
his own, and that not even the love and 
respect he felt for his father could shake his 
own conviction of truth. The last time 
his father ** applied the rod " was when 
David refused to read '' Wilber force's 
Practical Christianity." The boy thought 
the matter over in his canny Scotch way, and 
concluded that, on the whole, the rod was 
the less severe form of punishment. So he 
took the rod, and refused a religious book 
for which he had no use. Looking back 
upon his own religious development in after 
years, he used to confess that at this stage 
he was *' colour-blind." When he was led 



I DR. LIVINGSTONE 9 

to see that God and Nature are ** not at 
strife," and that God does not say one thing 
to the theologian and its contrary to the 
scientist, he accepted in his own simple and 
sincere way the Christian Gospel, and drew 
from it the same splendid faith in the 
universality of the Kingdom of God that in- 
spired the souls of the first apostles. To David 
Livingstone, to become a Christian was to 
become in spirit and desire a missionary. It 
is only necessary to add that the faith which 
he accepted with the full consent of heart 
and mind as a lad in Blantyre was the faith 
in which he died. 

The days of David Livingstone s boyhood 
were great days for missions. The 
churches were everywhere awakening to 
their opportunity and responsibility. A 
new **Acts of the Apostles" was being 
written. Letters from remote parts of the 
world, where the ancient battle between 
Christ and heathenism was being fought 
out anew, were eagerly read and deeply 
pondered. The romance and heroism of 
the majestic campaign captured and kindled 



lo DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

both young and old. The year of 
Livingstone's birth was a year of singular 
triumph in the South Seas. It was the 
year when his great countryman Robert 
Morrison completed his translation of the 
New Testament into Chinese. When he 
was some six or seven years old, another 
famous Scotch missionary, Robert Moffat, 
was settling on the Kuruman ; and Mrs. 
Moffat bore in her arms a baby girl 
destined to become David Livingstones 
wife. The life of Henry Marty n was a 
supreme call to consecration ; while the 
story of the heroes and heroines of the 
Moravian missions was almost as familiar 
in that humble Scottish home as the history 
of the Apostle Paul. 

A specially powerful influence in moving 
Livingstone to his life-decision was the 
appeal of Charles Gutzlaff for medical 
missionaries for China. 

Livingstone was a born naturalist ; and 
despite his father s old-fashioned prejudices, 
he made himself a scientist at a very early age, 
searching old quarries for the shells in the 



I DR. LIVINGSTONE ii 

carboniferous limestone, " scouring Clyde- 
side for simples/' and arranging the flora of 
the district in botanical order. These 
expeditions were often very prolonged, and 
involved the endurance of fatigue and 
hunger; but the lad could not be discour- 
aged. Unconsciously he was bracing him- 
self physically for the toils and tasks of after 
years. There is a fine story about the 
revenge he took upon his native African 
escort, on one occasion, who had been 
misguided enough to talk disrespectfully about 
his slim figure and shortness of stature. 
Thereupon, Livingstone took them along for 
two or three days at the top of their speed 
till they cried out for mercy ! He had not 
scoured Clyde-side for simples for nothing. 
His fearlessness is well illustrated in his 
daring and reckless exploit of climbing the 
ruins of Bothwell Castle, so that he might 
carve his name higher than any other 
boy had carved his. There, too, was the 
childlike ambition, which remained with him 
to the end, to do something which nobody 
else could surpass. '' No one," he wrote at 



12 DR. LIVINGSTONE ch. i 

the very end of his life, on his last expedi- 
tion, *' will cut me out after this exploration 
is accomplished " Then he adds finely, " and 
may the good Lord of all help me to show 
myself one of his stout-hearted servants, an 
honour to my children, and perhaps to my 
country and race/' The story of Livingstone 
is told there : it is the story of one of the 
good Lord s stout-hearted servants. 

All the drudgery and hardship of his lot 
went to make him the man he was. The 
days of his boyhood were '*the good old 
days " — the days when children of ten years 
old were sent to work in the factories ; and 
David went with the rest. No eight hours' 
day his ! No humane legislature thought it 
wise and well to forbid or curtail child labour. 
From six o'clock in the morning till eight 
o'clock at night he worked as a piecer ; and all 
the world knows how he used to place the book 
he was studying on a portion of the spin- 
ning-jenny, and snatch a sentence or two as 
he passed at his work. He tells us he thus 
kept '' a pretty constant study, undisturbed by 
the roar of machinery," and that this habit 




THE CLYDE AND RUINS OF THE OLD MILL AT ELANTYRE. 




WHERE LIVINGSTONE LIVED AT ONGAR, 
»3 



14 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

of concentration stood him in good stead in 
after years when he wanted to read and 
write even '* amidst the dancing and song of 
savages." As if this were not enough, after 
a fourteen hours' day in the factory he would 
go off to a night-school provided by the 
employers ; and then home to work at his 
Latin till '' mother put out the candle." It 
is well for ten-year-old humanity when it has 
a mother to put out the candle, or Mother 
Nature might have put out another candle, 
and where would Africa have been then ? 
Nine years of such severe and determined 
work as this brought him to University age ; 
and as Glasgow University was hard by, 
and as he was promoted to be a spinner by 
this time and able to earn enough in the 
summer to keep him during the other six 
months, he entered as a student for Greek 
and medicine, and seems to have success- 
fully schemed to attend some Divinity 
lectures even in the summer months. The 
Scotch Universities are the paradise of poor 
and struggling students who have more 
brains and chara.Qter tl^aa bawbees : but the. 



I DR. LIVINGSTONE 15 

education was not free in those days. The 
money for fees had to be pinched and 
scraped ; but it was found somehow, and in 
the early winter of 1836, David and his 
father walked to the city from Blantyre 
and trudged the streets of Glasgow all day, 
with the snow upon the ground, till at last 
they found a room in '* Rotten Row" that 
could be had for two shillings a week. 
Lodged thus as cheaply as could be 
managed, he applied himself with all his 
unfailing diligence and zest to learn Greek 
and medicine, as well as to such theological 
studies as could be undertaken under the 
leadership of the Rev. Dr. Wardlaw — one 
of Glasgow s most famous divines— who 
trained men for the Congregational ministry, 
and for whom Livingstone had a great 
admiration. 

During his second session at Glasgow 
(1837-8) David Livingstone came to the most 
fateful decision of his life. - He decided to 
offer himself to one of the Missionary Societies 
for foreign service. He chose the London 
Missionary Society because of his sympathy 



1 6 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

with the catholicity of its basis. It existed 
*'to send neither Episcopacy, nor Presby- 
terianism, nor Independency to the heathen, 
but the Gospel of Christ." '' This,'' said 
Livingstone ''exactly agreed with my ideas." 
He was a member of a Congregational 
church, and the London Missionary Society 
has always been in the main supported by 
these churches. But the Society was 
founded by Evangelical churchmen and 
prominent Presbyterians, as well as by 
Congregationalists, and nothing appealed 
more to Livingstone than this union of 
Christian people in the service of an un- 
christian world. 

In due course the acceptance of his offer 
arrived, and in the early autumn of 1838 he 
travelled to London, where he was to appear 
before the Mission Board at 57 Aldersgate 
Street. One can imagine that, apart alto- 
gether from the momentous character of his 
visit, and the anxiety he must have felt as to 
his acceptance by the Directors, this first 
visit to London must have been a most 
impressive one to the young Scotsman. He 



I DR. LIVINGSTONE 17 

heard many distinguished preachers, and 
visited the famous sites of London. Among 
other places, he went with a companion to 
Westminster Abbey. It is a thrilling 
thought, as Mr. Thomas Hughes reminds us, 
that he was never known to enter that Abbey 
again until his remains were borne thither 
amid the lamentations of the whole civilised 
world, and all the honours that the living can 
ever pay to the dead. 

The examination by the Directors was 
satisfactory ; and according to the custom 
of the time Livingstone was committed for a 
short period of probation to the tutorship of 
the Rev. Richard Cecil, the minister of the 
little town of Chipping Ongar in Essex. 
There he was expected to give proof of 
his preaching ministry, with what result is 
generally known. He was sent one Sunday 
evening to preach in the village of Stanford 
Rivers, where the tradition of Livingstone's 
first effort at preaching is still cherished. 
The raw, somewhat heavy-looking Scotch 
youth, to whom public speech was always a 
difficulty, gave out his text **very 



1 8 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

deliberately-" That was all the con- 
gregation got. The sermon composed on 
the text had fled, owing to the nervous 
embarrassment produced by a handful of 
people in a village chapel. '' Friends," said 
the youth, " I have forgotten all I had to 
say " — '* and hurrying out of the pulpit he 
left the chapel." I have no doubt that 
*' hurrying" is the right word. Never was 
failure more absolute. It is hardly to be 
wondered at that the Rev. Richard Cecil 
reported to the Directors his fears that 
Livingstone had mistaken his vocation. It 
was a risk to send someone to preach to the 
heathen who might possibly forget what he 
had come to say when he arrived. More- 
over, criticism was made of his extreme 
slowness and hesitancy in prayer. Yet the 
man who was nearly rejected by the Society 
on this account, died on his knees in the heart 
of Africa, while all the world was awed by the 
thought that David Livingstone passed away 
in the act of prayer. As it was his probation 
was extended, and at the end of another two 
months he was finally accepted, and went up 



11 DR. LIVINGSTONE 19 

to London to continue his medical studies in 
the London Hospitals. One of the most 
striking things ever written about him was 
by the celebrated Dr. Isaac Taylor, of Ongar. 
'* Now after nearly forty years," he writes, 
*' I remember his step, the characteristic 
forward tread, firm, simple, resolute, neither 
fast nor slow, no hurry and no dawdle, but 
which evidently meant — getting there ! *' In 
November, 1840, he was able to return to 
Glasgow, and qualify as a Licentiate of the 
Faculty of Physicians and Surgeons ; and a 
few days later he said goodbye to the old 
folks at home, one of whom — his father — he 
was never to see on earth again. On 
November 20th he was ordained at Albion 
Chapel, London, and three weeks later he 
sailed on the " George " to Algoa Bay in 
South Africa. One chapter in his memor- 
able life was now definitely closed. Among 
the memories in it there are few if any that 
he cherished more than that of his old 
Sunday School teacher, David Hogg, who 
sent for him as he lay dying and said, '* Now 
lad, make religion the every-day business of 



20 DR. LIVINGSTONE ch. i 

your life, and not a thing of fits and starts, 
for if you do, temptation and other things 
will get the better of you." It is hardly too 
much to say that the old man s death-bed 
counsel became the watchword of his life. 



CHAPTER II 

A VOYAGE of five months saw Livingstone at 
Algoa Bay, preparing for his first journey 
into the interior of Africa, the grave of so 
many reputations, but the land of his 
renown. Until within a short time of his 
departure from London he had hoped and 
intended to go to China as a medical 
missionary. But the ** Opium War " was 
still in progress ; and for the time being 
China was impossible. Moreover, Living- 
stone was brought under the influence of 
one of the greatest personalities in modern 
missionary enterprise. Robert Moffat was 
home on furlough, and his wonderful story 
no less than his striking presence, exerted 
their spell over the young Scot and changed 
the goal of his ambition. Dr. Moffat was 
wont to describe the numberless African 



SI 



22 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

villages stretching away to the north where 
no missionary had yet penetrated ; and his 
appeal found a ready response in Living- 
stone's heart. None of us who have heard 
the old man eloquent, and on whose 
memories the stately striking figure, with 
the flowing beard, and the iron-grey 
tousled hair, made an indelible im- 
pression, will wonder that any young 
man's imagination should be kindled 
by his address, or should discover in the 
mysterious depths of the vast African con- 
tinent the field for his life work. It was to 
Dr. Moffat's station at Kuruman that David 
Livingstone took his first journey. The 
distance was seven hundred miles ; and he 
immediately surrendered to the interest and 
delight of travel by ox waggon, the freedom 
of the open air life, the variety of the scenery 
and sport, and the attractiveness of the 
natives, who engaged his sympathy from the 
first. It was now that his hardy training in 
Scotland stood him in good stead. He knew 
how to put up with inconveniences cheerfully, 
and face difficulties with resolution, while his 



11 DR. LIVINGSTONE 23 

resourcefulness was as inexhaustible as his 
kindliness. That '* characteristic forward 
tread " of which Isaac Taylor had spoken 
which *^ meant getting there " was put to the 
proof and not found wanting. To him there 
was a way out of every situation, however 
critical ; and the " bold free course '' which he 
took with the natives, together with his 
medical skill and unwearying goodness, won 
their loyalty. They recognised him as a 
great chief, and his whole career is eloquent 
of the extraordinary devotion which he 
inspired in them. At the end of May, 1841, 
he was at Kuruman, with instructions from 
the Directors of the Society to turn his 
attention to the North — instructions that 
absolutely coincided with his own aspira- 
tion. It is notable that he formed the very 
highest opinion of the value of Christian 
missions from the results that he saw. Let 
it be remembered that he was always a slow, 
cautious Scot in all his judgments, with a 
severely truthful and scientific mind, and his 
testimony becomes the more valuable. 
" Everything I witnessed surpassed my 



24 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

hopes/' he writes home ; '' if this is a fair 
sample the statements of the missionaries as 
to their success are far within the mark." 
He is full of the praises of the Christian 
Hottentots, who are ''far superior in attain- 
ments to what I had expected ; " their worship 
reminded him of the old covenanters. It was 
thus, then, that with his zeal for his mission 
of evangelism greatly stimulated, he started 
north to the country of the Bakwains. 

A short circuit sufficed to reveal the pro- 
blem, and he returned to Kuruman to think 
out the best plan of campaign. The first 
step was a characteristic one. It was to 
isolate himself absolutely from all European 
society and live among the natives, so as to 
learn their language and study their habits 
and their laws. For six months he rigor- 
ously pursued his plan, and found his reward 
in the new appreciation he gained of the 
native character and mode of thinking, and 
the extent to which he conquered their 
confidences. So far advanced had he 
become in the knowledge of their language 
that he was able to enjoy a laugh at himself 



II DR. LIVINGSTONE 25 

for "turning poet." One can believe that 
to Livingstone this was no easy work ; but 
he succeeded in making Sechuana transla- 
tions of several hymns which were after- 
wards adopted and printed by the French 
missionaries. ** If they had been bad," he 
says in his naive way, '' I don't see that they 
can have had any motive for using them." 

He was waiting now for the final decision 
of the directors authorising the advance into 
the unoccupied district of the north. The 
decision was long in coming. We must 
recognise that such a resolution was not an 
easy one for those who carried all the 
responsibilities at home. Even their most 
trusted advisers on the actual field were not 
agreed. Dr. Philip, the special representa- 
ti\ e of the Society at the Cape, and a man 
of great personal power and sagacity, shook 
his head over Livingstone's impetuosity and 
talked about the dangers. ** If we wait till 
there is no danger," said Livingstone, ** we 
shall never go at all.*' It was quite true ; 
but there were big problems of policy to be 
decided. Many held by the watch woru 



26 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

''concentration/' which is always plausible, 
and often conclusive. Settlements for edu- 
cational and industrial developments had 
proved their value. On the other hand 
Livingstone had unanswerable logic on his 
side when he argued that the missionaries in 
the South had too scanty a population and 
that the call to possess the North was urgent, 
for the traders and the slavers were pushing 
out there, and the gospel of humanity was 
imperatively needed. 

There was long delay, but in the mean- 
time Livingstone was making proof of his 
ministry. His medical knowledge helped to 
spread his fame. He fought the rain- 
makejTS at their own arts with the scientific 
weapon of irrigation and won his battle. 
He made friends with the Bechuana Chief, 
Sechele, one of the most intelligent and 
interesting of the many great natives who 
surrendered to the charm of Livingstone. 
Sechele was deeply impressed by the 
missionary's message, but profoundly 
troubled in spirit. He said, *'You startle 
me — these words make all my bones to 



II DR. LIVINGSTONE 27 

shake — I have no more strength in me. 
But my forefathers were living at the same 
time yours were, and how is it that they did 
not send them word about these terrible 
things sooner. They all passed away into 
darkness without knowing whither they were 
going." When Livingstone tried to explain 
to him the gradual spread of the Gospel 
knowledge, the chief refused to believe that 
the whole earth could be visited. There 
was a barrier at his very door — the Kalahari 
desert. Nobody could cross it. Even those 
who knew the country would perish, and no 
missionary would have a chance. As for his 
own people there was no difficulty in convert- 
ing them, always assuming that Livingstone 
would go to work in the right way. " Do 
you imagine these people will ever believe by 
your merely talking to them ? I can make 
them do nothing except by thrashing them, 
and if you like I will call my head-men and 
with our litupa (whips of rhinoceros hide) we 
will soon make them all believe together." 
It must be confessed, however, that Secheles 
state-church principles did not commend 



28 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

themselves to the mind of an ardent 
voluntaryist Hke Livingstone. ** In our 
relations with the people," he writes, 
**we were simply strangers exercising no 
authority or control whatever. Our in- 
fluence depended entirely on persuasion ; 
and having taught them by kind conversa- 
tion as well as by public instruction, I 
expected them to do what their own sense 
of right and wrong dictated.*' He then sets 
on record '' five instances in which by our 
influence on public opinion war was 
prevented," and pays a high tribute to the 
intelligence of the natives who in many 
respects excel ** our own uneducated 
peasantry." This attitude of appreciation 
and respectful sympathy was the secret of 
Livingstone's unparalleled influence over the 
African tribes. It was on a return from a 
visit to Sechele in June, 1843, that Living- 
stone heard the good news of the formal 
sanction of the forward movement. He 
hailed the decision, as he said, *'with 
inexpressible delight " ; and in a fine letter 
written to Mr. Cecil declared his fixed 



II DR. LIVINGSTONE 29 

resolve to give less attention to the art of 
physical healing and more to spiritual 
amelioration. He has no ambition to be 
'*a very good doctor but a useless drone 
of a missionary." He feels that to carry out 
this purpose will in»volve some self-denial, 
but he will make the sacrifice cheerfully. 
As for the charge of ambition, *' I really 
am ambitious to preach beyond other men s 
lines. ... I am only determined to go on 
and do all I can, while able, for the poor 
degraded people of the north." 

In less than two months he was ready for 
the new move. The first journey was two 
hundred miles to the north-east, to Mabotsa, 
which he had previously noted as suitable 
for a station. Here he built a house with 
his own hands, and settled down for three 
years' work among the Bakatlas. During 
this period two events occurred that were 
especially notable. The first went far towards 
ending his career. The facts are well- 
known from Livingstone's own graphic but 
simple description. He had gone with the 
Bakatlas to hunt some lions which had 



30 DR. LIVINGSTONE ch. n 

committed serious depredations in the 
village. The lions were encircled by the 
natives but broke through the line and 
escaped. As Livingstone was returning, 
however, he saw one of the beasts on a 
small hill, and fired into him at about thirty 
yards' distance. Loading again, he heard a 
shout, and '' looking half-round saw the lion 
just in the act of springing upon me/* The 
lion seized him by the shoulder and "growl- 
ing horribly close to my ear, he shook m.e as 
a terrier dog does a rat." We now see the 
advantage of a scientific education. Living- 
stone was able to analyse his own feelings 
and emotions during the process of being 
gnawed by a lion. He observed that '' the 
shock produced a stupor, a sort of dreami- 
ness '' ; there was *' no sense of pain, nor 
feeling of terror." He compares it to the 
influence of chloroform ; and argues that 
^' this peculiar state is probably produced in 
all animals killed by the carnivora, and if so 
is a merciful provision by our benevolent 
Creator for lessening the pain of death." 
In this judgment he anticipated some 



K.1^,J. ./^^^ 




LIVINGSTONE ATTACKED BY A LION, 



31 



32 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

weighty modern conclusions by noted 
physiologists. So intere^^ting does Living- 
stone find these observations, that it seems 
as if he must have been almost disappointed 
when the lion released him and turned his 
attention to others less well equipped for 
scientific investigation. On the whole 
Livingstone escaped marvellously well, but 
the bone was crunched into splinters, and 
there were eleven teeth wounds on the upper 
part of his arm. The arm indeed was never 
really well again. It will be remembered 
that it was by the false joint in this limb 
that the remains of Livingstone were 
identified on their arrival in England. It 
will also be remembered that, as has been so 
well said, '* for thirty years afterwards all 
his labours and adventures, entailing such 
exertion and fatigue, were undertaken with a 
limb so maimed that it was painful for him 
to raise a fowling-piece, or in fact to place 
the left arm in any position above the level 
of the shoulder." 

This was a bad business. But Providence 
has a way of making up to good men for 



II DR. LIVINGSTONE 33 

afflictions of this kind ; and Livingstone's 
compensation came to him in the following 
year, when he had something to face that 
demanded more daring than a mere every- 
day encounter with lions. He had been a 
bachelor in Africa for four years, and he had 
resolved to try his fortune with Mary 
Moffat, Dr. Moffat's eldest daughter. The 
proposal was made ** beneath one of the 
fruit trees'' at Kuruman in 1844. He got 
the answer he desired and deserved, and 
Mary Moffat took him with all his erratic 
ways, and became his devoted wife. '' She 
was always the best spoke in the wheel at 
home/' he writes; '*and when I took her 
with me on two occasions to lake Ngami, 
and far beyond, she endured more than some 
who have written large books of travels." 
In course of time three sons and a daughter 
came to '* cheer their solitude,*' and increase 
their responsibilities. But from the first they 
set themselves to fulfil what Livingstone 
called the ideal missionary life, '*the husband 
a jack-of- all-trades, and the wife a maid-of- 
<all-work." The catalogue of necessary 



34 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

accomplishments sounds somewhat embar- 
rassing, and one realises that the ordinary 
college training is in many respects incom- 
plete. Here it is, as Livingstone expresses 
it — '' Building, gardening, cobbling, doctor- 
ing, tinkering, carpentering, gun-mending, 
farriering, waggon-mending, preaching, school- 
ing, lecturing on physics, occupying a chair 
in divinity, and helping my wife to make 
soap, candles, and clothes." It was certainly 
a busy and catholic career. He was carrying 
the whole of his world upon his own broad 
shoulders, and was guide, philosopher, and 
friend to a vast district. He had his enemies, 
too, as those who champion the rights of the 
poor and helpless are sure to have. To 
the north were to be found settlements of 
unscrupulous and marauding Boers, who 
held by all the unenlightened views of the 
relation of the white races to the black which 
were only recently extinct in England where 
the financial interest in slavery died hard in 
1833. These Boer marauders lived largely 
on slave-labour and on pillage ; and Living- 
stone was brought into open conflict with 



II DR. LIVINGSTONE 35 

them. On one side they may be said to 
have barred his advance. The tribes he 
served and loved lived under the shadow of 
a Boer invasion. The time was to come 
when the cloud would burst over Sechele and 
his unoffending people, when his wives 
would be slain and his children carried away 
into slavery ; when many of the bravest of 
his people would be massacred, and Living- 
stones house sacked and gutted in his 
absence. This complicity of the northern 
Boers in those outrages on native tribes 
which history most frequently associates with 
the Portuguese, earned Livingstone s stern 
indignation and detestation ; though he 
never did the Boers of South Africa the 
injustice of confounding the lawless raiders 
with the main body of settlers, of whom he 
wrote *' the Boers generally . . . are a sober, 
industrious, and most hospitable body of 
peasantry." 

He had, however, already begun to have 
glimpses of what his life-witness was to be. 
He saw that the curse of Africa lay not only 
in the eternal conflicts of tribe with tribe. 



36 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

That form of misery was original to the 
continent and its savage inhabitants. But a 
new curse had fallen upon the unhappy 
people by the intrusion of those who united 
with a higher material civilisation a more 
developed and refined form of cruelty. The 
diabolical cunning and callousness that, under 
the guise of trading, would gain the con- 
fidence of a peaceful tribe, only at last to rise 
up some fatal night, murder the old, enslave 
the young, burn the huts, and march the 
chained gang hundreds of miles to the sea, 
have made the records of African Slavery the 
most awful reading in human history. 
Imagination carries the story one step 
further. We hardly need the genius of a 
Turner to suggest to us the horror of a slave- 
ship under the torrid tropical skies, with its 
dead and dying human freight. When the 
slave-trade is realised in all its accumulated 
horrors, it is easy to understand how, to a man 
of Livingstone's noble Christian sensibility, 
the manifest duty of the Church of Christ was 
to engage in a war-to-the-death struggle 
against this darkest of all inhumanities. 



II DR. LIVINGSTONE 37 

He was planning his campaign during the 
years when he passed with his wife and 
children from one settlement to another. 
Three houses he built with his own hands, 
and made some progress in the cultivation of 
gardens round them. The first was at 
Mabotsa. It was the home to which he 
brought his young bride and to leave it went 
to his heart. His going was the result of the 
attitude adopted towards him by a brother 
missionary. Sooner than cause scandal 
among the tribe he resolved to give every- 
thing up and go elsewhere. '* Paradise will 
make amends for all our privations and 
sorrows here," he says simply. It is some- 
thing to know that the missionary who did 
him this injustice lived '' to manifest a very 
different spirit." Livingstone next cast in his 
lot with Sechele and his people, and built his 
second house at Chonuane, some forty miles 
from Mabotsa. It was hard work, and it 
made a big drain on his very small income, 
but it was not his way to complain. The 
hardship fell more severely on his wife and 
infant children, and he felt the deprivations 



38 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

and inconveniences most for them. The 
house was finished in course of time, and a 
school was erected too, where the children 
were instructed, and services held. But 
nature was against a long settlement at 
Chonuane. A period of prolonged drought 
set in. Supplies were exhausted. The 
people had to go further afield, and the 
position became untenable. There was 
nothing for it but for the Livingstones 
to go too. All the labour of rebuilding had 
to be undertaken again, this time at 
Kolobeng, another forty miles on. Provi- 
dence was indeed to Livingstone 'Mike as an 
eagle stirring up the nest." Such of the 
tribe as were left went with him and a new 
village was constructed. Livingstone and 
his family lived for a year in **a mere hut.'' 
In 1848 the new house was actually built, 
despite some serious personal accidents of 
which he made light in his usual way. 
** What a mercy to be in a house again ! " he 
writes home ; '' a year in a little hut through 
which the wind blew our candles into 
glorious icicles (as a poet would say) by. 



II DR. LIVINGSTONE 39 

night, and in which crowds of flies con- 
tinually settled on the eyes of our poor little 
brats by day, makes us value our present 
castle. Oh Janet, know thou, if thou art 
given to building castles in the air, that that 
is easy work compared to erecting cottages 
on the ground ! " Such was the building of 
his third house, the one that was afterwards 
sacked by the Boers. Then he built no 
more houses. Indeed, he never had a home 
of his own in Africa afterwards. The dark 
problem of Central Africa had him in its 
grip. He sent his wife and children home 
to England ; and he himself became like 
that Son of Man whose example he followed 
so nearly, one '*who had not where to lay 
his head.'' 

Before that time came, however, he had 
laid the foundations of his fame as an 
explorer by crossing the Kalahari Desert, 
and discovering Lake Ngami. The circum- 
stances that gave rise to this journey are 
easily detailed. The drought continued 
at Kolobeng as pitilessly as at Chonuane. 
Only the power of Livingstone's personality 



40 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

sufficed to retain the faith and loyalty of 
the tribes. He writes that they were 
always treated with '* respectful kindness" 
and never had an enemy among the natives. 
His enemies were among the '' dirty whites," 
who knew that he was the most dangerous 
obstacle to the slave-raids, and who objected 
to his policy of training Christian native 
teachers to be evangelists among their own 
kinsfolk. But though the tribes remained 
loyal, the fact remained that Livingstone 
had led a migration which had not resulted 
in a permanent settlement ; neither could he 
command the rain as their own rainmakers 
professed to be able to do. The heathen 
superstition that hostile doctors had put 
their country under an evil charm so that 
no rain should fall on it, prevailed even 
against their faith in the missionary. 
Secheles more enlightened mind found it 
difficult to understand why Livingstone s 
God did not answer the prayer for rain. Yet 
the work went forward at Kolobeng. The 
chief Sechele, after long hesitation on 
Livingstone s part, was baptised and entered 



II DR. LIVINGSTONE 41 

into communion with the little church. 
Trouble followed when he ** went home, 
gave each of his superfluous wives new 
clothing, and all his own goods, which they 
had been accustomed to keep in their huts 
for him, and sent them to their parents with 
an intimation that he had no fault to find 
with them, but that in parting with them he 
wished to follow the will of God." It was 
his solution of a social problem that can 
never be satisfactorily solved, and it was 
both courageous and generous, but ne result 
was seen in the fiercer resentment of the 
relatives of the women ; and while little or 
none of this fell upon Livingstone,, it served 
seriously to prejudice the religion which was 
responsible for Sechele s action. On every 
count, it was desirable to find the new and 
permanent station, where that central train- 
ing-ground for native missionaries could be 
established which Livingstone had constantly 
in view, and where the water supply would 
be less likely to fail. But where to go .'^ In 
the south, the field was well supplied with 



42 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

missionaries. To the east were the un- 
friendly Dutch, bent on making mischief. 
To the north lay the Kalahari desert, which 
Sechele had pronounced to be an impassable 
barrier to the progress of Christianity. ** It 
is utterly impossible even to us black men," 
he said. But the word *' impossible'* was 
not in Livingstone s dictionary. 

If my readers will take the trouble to look 
at an old map of South Africa they will 
find the whole vast track of the west which 
lies to the north of the Orange River, and 
includes Bechuana Land and Damara Land, 
described as desert, and the Kalahari Desert 
in the eastern portion of it. Kolobeng lay at 
the extreme west of what we know to-day as 
the Transvaal, some two hundred and fifty 
miles from Pretoria, and was more than 
four thousand feet above sea level, near the 
sources of the Limpopo River, which flows 
north and east, until it finally joins the ocean 
at Delagoa Bay. A straight line to Lake 
Ngami would have taken the travellers in a 
north-westerly direction a distance of little 



II DR. LIVINGSTONE 43 

more than three hundred miles. But it is 
doubtful whether they could have survived 
such a journey across an untrodden route, 
even if they had known accurately where 
the great lake lay. They were certainly well 
inspired to go due north to the Zouga River, 
and then follow it westward to the lake, 
though this route must have added two 
hundred miles to their journey. Three 
other Europeans, Colonel Steele, Mr. Murray, 
and Mr. Oswell — the latter one of Living- 
stone's life-long friends and a mighty African 
hunter, joined the expedition, which started 
on June ist, 1849, and reached the lake on 
August I St. Livingstone has given us a 
most g/aphic and detailed description of the 
desert with its sandy soil, its dry beds of 
ancient rivers, its trackless plains, its prairie 
grass, its patches of bushes, and the singular 
products of its soil with roots like large 
turnips that hold fluid beneath the soil, and 
above all the desert water-melons on which 
the Bushmen as well as the elephants anL 
antelopes, and even lions and hyaenas 



44 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

subsist. The Bushmen he found a thin, 
wiry, merry race capable of great endurance, 
as indeed the denizens of the desert must 
be. They existed under conditions that 
inspired the Bechuana with terror, for to add 
to the other dangers the desert was at times 
infested with serpents. 

It was a hazardous enterprise to which 
Livingstone and his fellow travellers were 
committed, and, humanly speaking, its success 
depended wholly on the discovery of water 
at periodical intervals. The ^' caravan " was 
a considerable one. Eighty cattle and 
twenty horses were not deemed too many 
for the waggons and for riding ; these had to 
be watered, and the twenty men besides. 
Progress was necessarily slow. None 
could face the burning heat of the mid-day 
hours. They had to move forward in the 
mornings and the evenings. The waggon- 
wheels sank deep into the soft, hot sand ; 
and the poor oxen dragging them laboriously 
forward were, at a critical time, nearly four 
days without water, **and their masters 



II DR. LIVINGSTONE 45 

scarcely better off." Aided, however, by the 
experience and keen instinct of the natives, 
they found wells in unsuspected places, and 
eventually made the banks of the Zouga 
River. After that, progress was easy. 
Leaving the waggons and oxen, they took to 
canoes, or wended their way along the river- 
banks, until, on the morning of August ist, 
they found themselves gazing on the waters 
of Lake Ngami, the first white people to see 
it so far as they knew. 

It had been one of the principal arguments 
with Livingstone for the journey that he 
would meet the famous chief Sebituane, who 
had saved the life of Sechele in his infancy, 
and who was renowned as a warrior and as a 
powerful and intelligent ruler. It meant 
another two hundred miles of travel to the 
north, and the jealousies of the chiefs, and 
their real or assumed fears for Livingstone's 
safety, prevented the realisation of his hopes 
on this journey. There was nothing for it 
but to go back to Kolobeng, where the 
drought persisted as absolute as ever. 



46 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

Livingstone's congregation and Mrs. Living- 
stone's school had disappeared in search of 
better watered lands. It was clear that for 
Livingstone there was here '*no abiding 
city." He resolved to transport his wife and 
three children to the north. He made more 
of an eastward circuit this time, and Sechele 
accompanied them to the fords of the 
Zouga. Mrs. Livingstone was the first 
white lady to see Lake Ngami ; but the 
purposed visit to Sebituane had again to be 
deferred. 

Livingstone's aid was invoked for a fever- 
stricken party of Englishmen who were 
hunting ivory. One was already dead, but 
the others recovered under his treatment. 
His own children, however, sickened ; and 
the party precipitately retired to *'the pure 
air of the desert," and so home to Kolobeng 
where another child was born to them, only 
to be carried away by an epidemic. 
'* Hers] is the first grave in all that country," 
writ-es the bereaved father, ** marked as 
the resting-place of one of whom it is 



II DR. LIVINGSTONE 47 

believed and confessed that she shall live 
again/* 

After a visit to Kuruman to rest and 
recruit, they were ready in April, 1851, for a 
third attempt to reach Sebituane. Mr. 
Oswell, the most valuable of comrades, was 
again with them. The journey was 
successful, but it came dangerously near to 
being disastrous to the whole family. This 
crisis occurred on the far side of the Zouga 
river, as they were travelling northward 
across absolute desert. The Bushman guide 
lost his way, and the supply of water in the 
waggons had been wasted by one of the 
servants. Livingstone tells the incident in a 
single paragraph, but the agony of it must 
nearly have killed him and his wife. **The 
next morning, the less there was of water 
the more thirsty the little rogues became. 
The idea of their perishing before our eyes 
was terrible. It would almost have been a 
relief to me to have been reproached with 
being the entire cause of the catastrophe, but 
not one syllable of upbraiding was uttered 



48 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

by their mother, though the tearful eye told 
the agony within. In the afternoon of the 
fifth day, to our inexpressible relief, some of 
the men returned with a supply of that fluid 
of which we had never before felt the true 
value." At last the often-postponed pleasure 
of meeting and greeting Sebituane was 
fulfilled, and the famous chief more than 
justified all expectations. He met the party 
on the Chobe river and conducted them 
with great ceremony and hospitality to his 
home. The way seemed to be opening for 
a new and auspicious missionary settlement, 
when in a few days Sebituane sickened and 
died. It was one of the greatest blows which 
Livingstone ever experienced. Its tragic 
suddenness almost stunned him. Looking 
back upon it now, it is easy to believe that it 
was not God's will that Livingstone should 
spend his life in the work of a missionary 
settlement, but should be driven out along 
the lonely, adventurous path where his 
destiny lay. 

But at the moment he only felt severely 



II DR. LIVINGSTONE 49 

the crushing of his hopes and frustration of 
his plans. Sebituane's daughter, who 
succeeded to the chieftainship, was full of 
kindly promises ; but difficulties multiplied 
in the way of a settlement, which further 
exploration of the district did not diminish. 
Penetrating a hundred and thirty miles to the 
north, Oswell and Livingstone came upon the 
broad channel of a noble river, called by the 
natives the Sesh^ke. It was the Zambesi, 
and some three hundred yards wide even 
there, more than a thousand miles from the 
mouth. Clearly the swamps round the great 
river afforded no healthy land for settling. 
There must be more exploration done, and 
meantime his wife and children must be 
cared for. They were hundreds of miles 
from any white settlement. Even so, 
Livingstone might still have debated his 
destiny. But revelations came to him that 
the slaver was even now establishing his 
accursed hold on this district. Sebituane's 
people, the Makololo, finest and loyallest of 
tribesmen, had begun to sell children, 



so DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

plundered from their native villages, for 
guns and calicoes. "It is broken-hearted- 
ness," he wrote much later, '*of which 
the slaves die. Even children, who showed 
wonderful endurance in keeping up with 
the chained gangs, would sometimes hear 
the sound of dancing and the merry tinkle of 
drums in passing near a village ; then the 
memory of home and happy days proved 
too much for them, they cried and sobbed, 
the broken heart came on, and they rapidly 
sank." This was the awful revelation that 
came to Livingstone in the land of the 
Makololo. Little more than a year before, 
such an idea as the barter of human beings 
for guns had never been known among this 
tribe. *' Had we been here sooner the slave 
traffic would never have existed," argued 
Livingstone. He began to have a vision of 
Christian settlements standing sentinel over 
the lives and happiness of the natives of the 
interior. If the slaver could make his way 
from the coast to the centre, so could the 
missionary. It was the one effective counter- 
stroke in the battle for human liberty. But it 



II DR. LIVINGSTONE 51 

meant separation from wife and bairns. He 
must return and do this work alone. He 
could risk no one s life but his own. His 
decision was taken. He devotes only a 
single paragraph to the long and arduous 
journey to Cape Town. It was a matter 
of fifteen hundred miles, and part of it was 
through territory where a so-called Caffre 
War was being waged, which excited 
Livingstone s scorn for the waste of blood 
and treasure. He was an object of suspicion 
at the Cape. The State authorities sus- 
pected his humanitarian sympathies, and the 
Church officials his theological orthodoxy. 
He was in debt, and had anticipated his 
small salary for more than a year in advance. 
But he had written to the Directors of the 
London Missionary Society in the most 
resolute terms. *' Consider the multitudes 
that in the Providence of God have been 
brought to light in the country of Sebituane ; 
the probability that in our efforts to evan- 
gelise we shall put a stop to the slave trade 
in a large region, and by means of the high- 



52 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

way into the north which we have dis- 
covered bring unknown nations into the 
sympathies of the Christian World. . . . 
Nothing but a strong conviction that the 
step will lead to the Glory of Christ would 
make me orphanise my children. . . . Should 
yqu not feel yourselves justified in incurring 
the expense of their support in England, I 
shall feel called upon to renounce the hope 
of carrying the Gospel into that country. . . . 
But stay, I am not sure : so powerfully 
convinced am I that it is the will of our Lord 
that I should go, I will go, no matter who 
opposes ; but from you I expect nothing but 
encouragement." A happy comment on this 
letter is found in Livingstone's '' Missionary 
Travels," in the paragraph recording the 
farewell to his wife and children. ** Having 
placed my family on board a homeward- 
bound ship, and promised to rejoin them in 
two years, we parted for, as it subsequently 
proved, nearly five years. The Directors of 
the London Missionary Society signified 
their cordial approval of my project by 



II DR. LIVINGSTONE 53 

leaving the matter entirely to my own 
discretion, and I have much pleasure in 
acknowledging my obligations to the gentle- 
men composing that body for always acting 
in an enlightened spirit, and with as much 
liberality as their constitution would allow." 
Livingstone started back for the interior 
on the 8th of June, 1852. He was now in 
his fortieth year. 



CHAPTER III 

It is difficult to summarise Livingstone's 
achievements during the eleven years he had 
spent in Africa. He had penetrated furthest 
north from the Cape of any white man. He 
had discovered Lake Ngami, and the upper 
reaches of the Zambesi. He had given 
Christianity a foothold among the Bakwains 
and the Makololo. He had converted one 
of the most remarkable chiefs in Central 
Africa. He had built three houses with his 
own hands, and had taught many hundreds 
to read. He had exercised the healing art 
to the relief and benefit of thousands. He 
had made some progress in reducing Sechu- 
ana to a grammatical language ; and had 
even composed hymns in it. He had made 
invaluable scientific researches, and had 
enriched our knowledge of the animalia, 

54 



CH. Ill DR. LIVINGSTONE S5 

flora, and fauna of Central Africa. Above 
all, he had seen at first hand the horrors of 
the slave traffic, and had vowed himself to 
the ultimate prevention of this form of ''man's 
inhumanity to man." Eleven busy, arduous, 
and perilous years had brought him to mid- 
life. He was now about to dedicate all his 
ripe experience and unique powers of head 
and heart to the religious and social redemp- 
tion of the dark interior of the continent to 
which he had consecrated his life. Even 
during his brief sojourn at the Cape he had 
been perfecting himself for the work that 
lay before him. He had studied astronomy, 
and had learned to take observations under 
Sir T. Maclear, the Astronomer Royal, who 
wrote of him afterwards: *'What that man 
has done is unprecedented. You could go 
to any point across the entire continent 
along Livingstone's track, and feel certain of 
your position.'* In David Livingstone's 
judgment it was impossible for a man to be 
too thoroughly equipped for the great 
business of a missionary. 

In one respect his equipment was neces- 



S6 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

sarily poor. His financial resources were so 
meagre that he had to fall back on very 
lean kine to draw his waggon, which is why 
the journey to Kuruman took a full three 
months. There a broken wheel detained 
him, and possibly saved his life ; for this was 
the time selected by the band of Dutch 
marauders to wreak their vengeance on him, 
and on the hapless tribe of Sechele. It is a 
shocking story, and in his sympathy with 
Sechele, sixty of whose people had been 
massacred, Livingstone could almost forget 
his own personal loss, though he grieved 
sorely over the wanton destruction of his 
books. Amid all his sorrow and heart- 
break, he can yet smile at the humorous 
side. '' We shall move more easily now that 
we are lightened of our furniture. They 
have taken away our sofa. I never had a 
good rest on it. We had only got it ready 
when we left. Well, they can't have taken 
away all the stones. We shall have a seat 
in spite of them, and that, too, with a merry 
heart which doeth good like a medicine.'* 
Never in this world was anyone who had so 



Ill DR. LIVINGSTONE 57 

stout a philosophy for times of misfortune. 
He could jest that ''the Boers had saved him 
the trouble of making a will." 

Poor Sechele in his despair resolved on a 
personal appeal for justice to the great 
White Queen, and actually travelled to the 
Cape to take ship to England. He was 
shown much kindness there, and eventually 
returned, gathered the people around him, 
and became a stronger chief than before, 
while he continued to instruct his tribe in 
the Bible, without any assistance from a 
missionary. There are few more striking 
proofs of the enduring power of Livingstone s 
personal influence and Christian faith. 

The journey through our old friend the 
desert to the Chobe river, and across it to 
where Sekeletu, the son of Sebituane, was 
now reigning, was more arduous and perilous 
than it had been previously. The floods 
from the annual inundation of the Chobe 
were an almost invincible obstacle ; yet where 
the waters did not lie the heat was torrid. 
" At the surface of the ground in the sun the 
thermometer registered 125°. The hand 



58 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

cannot be held on the earth, and even the 
horny feet of the natives must be protected 
by sandals of hide." The battle with the 
waters of the Chobe and its tributaries would 
have ended in the defeat of anyone less lion- 
hearted than this traveller. Many of the 
natives retired from the encounter on the 
easy pretext of throwing dice and declaring 
that the gods willed their return. Some of 
them feigned sickness, to ride in the 
waggons ; and it required infinite patience 
and humouring to get them forward. Part 
of the journey lay through dense forest, and 
laborious days were spent swinging the axe 
to make a waggon track. The rivers 
effectually stopped the waggons ; and Living- 
stone took to a pontoon, and afterwards to 
canoes. But there was much wading to do 
under a blistering sun, and through reeds 
that '' made our hands all raw and bloody," 
and thorns that tore even leather trousers. 
They were glad to sleep in a filthy deserted 
hut ; and at night the cold dews descended, 
and the mosquitoes gathered in clouds. 
They were disturbed by the hippopotami. 



Ill DR. LIVINGSTONE 59 

and the eerie waters were alive with water- 
snakes. But no combination of perils had 
any terror for one the alphabet of whose 
creed was that *'man is immortal till his 
work is done.'' At twilight of one day, a 
village was descried on the river bank. It 
was Moremi, and Livingstone had reached 
his beloved Makololo at last. *' The inhabit- 
ants looked like people who had seen a 
ghost," he says ; but what he himself really 
looked like he forbears to add. ** He has 
dropped among us from the clouds, yet came 
riding on the back of a hippopotamus," — this 
was their appropriate description of the 
pontoon. **We Makololo thought no one 
could cross the Chobe without our know- 
ledge, but here he drops among us like a 
bird." They returned with him, ''took the 
waggons to pieces and carried them across 
on a number of canoes lashed together." 
On the 23rd of May, 1853, they reached 
Linyanti, the capital town of the Makololo, 
where the new chief, Sekeletu, received 
them '*in royal style." 

Livingstone's problem had now definitely 



6o DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

to be solved. Sekeletu was not a whit 
behind Sebituane in friendliness, and not 
much inferior in intelligence. He had no 
desire for the Bible, fearing that it might 
compel him to content himself with one wife. 
But he set an example to the tribe in rever- 
ent attention to Livingstone's simple preach- 
ing, and he had absolute faith in the 
protection afforded to his people by Living- 
stone s presence and skill. But exactly a 
week after the arrival at Linyanti, Living- 
stone had his first taste of malaria, nor did 
the well-meant efforts of the native doctors 
do much to cure him. He experienced its 
weakening effect. If he looked up suddenly 
he was affected with a strange giddiness. 
'' Everything appeared to rush to the left, and 
if I did not catch hold of some support I fell 
heavily on the ground." The same horrible 
sensations occurred at night, " whenever I 
turned suddenly round." One thing was 
clear — Linyanti was no place for a healthy 
settlement. Some might add that with fever 
in the system it was idle to think of a journey 
of a thousand miles or more. But this was 



in DR. LIVINGSTONE 6i 

not Livingstone's way of looking at things. 
'' There is a good deal in not giving in to 
this disease/' he writes; **he who is low- 
spirited will die sooner than the man who is 
not of a melancholic nature." Ill as he was, 
he was resolute to continue his explorations, 
and with Sekeletu and a large band of 
Makololo for companions, he travelled some 
hundreds of miles of waterway, ascending the 
great river to the north-west from Sesheke. 
Here the Zambesi is called the Leeambye, 
and Livingstone expresses his delight at 
skimming along in great canoes, gazing on a 
wonderful inland river which no white man 
had hitherto explored. He finds, as ever, in 
the wonders and beauties of nature, the 
splendour of the wild birds, and the curious 
fascination of the river-beasts some relief 
from the awful spectacle, constantly present, 
of human cruelty and degradation. *' The 
sciences,'' he writes, ** exhibit such wonderful 
intelligence and design in all their various 
ramifications, some time ought to be de- 
voted to them before engaging in mission- 
ary work. • . . We may feel tha-t we are 



62 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

leaning on His bosom while living in a 
world clothed in beauty, and robed with 
the glorious perfection of its Maker and 
Preserver . . . He who stays his mind on 
his ever-present, ever-energetic God, will not 
fret himself because of evil-doers. He that 
believeth shall not make haste." It was 
indeed well for him that he had this power 
to absorb himself in ** whatsoever things are 
lovely," for the nightmare of heathenism was 
always with him. He has to witness 
Sekeletu's revenge on those who had plotted 
against him. Some of the scenes are in- 
credibly horrible ; and his protests are 
unavailing. The miseries of slavery wrung 
his heart, and as he advances into the dark 
interior, the chorus of human agonies is ever 
in his ears. '' I was in closer contact with 
heathens than I had ever been before, and 
though all were as kind to me as possible, 
yet to endure the dancing, roaring and sing- 
ing, the jesting, the grumbling, quarrellings 
and murderings of these children of nature 
was the severest penance I had yet undergone 
in the course of my missionary duties." 



Ill DR. LIVINGSTONE 63 

Again he exclaims in his Diary, '^ the more 
intimately I become acquainted with bar- 
barians, the more disgusting does heathenism 
become. It is inconceivably vile . . . they 
never visit anywhere but for the purpose of 
plunder and oppression. They never go any- 
where but with a club or spear in hand. . . . 
They need a healer. May God enable me to 
be such to them.'* Slowly but surely the 
whole tragedy of Africa is unveiled before 
him. The fair landscape of its rivers and 
forests, the gay plumage of its birds, and 
beauty of its living creatures, is like a 
gorgeous curtain covering unspeakable 
depths of pain and sin. The people gather 
in hundreds to hear him, and especially to 
see the wonders of his magic lantern, but he 
cannot in a brief stay undo the superstitions 
and inhumanities of centuries. His eye is on 
the future. *' A minister who has not seen so 
much pioneer service as I have done would 
have been shocked to see so little effect 
produced. . . . We can afford to work in 
faith. . . . Future missionaries will be re- 
warded by conversions for every sermon. 



64 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

We are their pioneers. They will doubtless 
have more light than we, but we served our 
Master earnestly and proclaimed the Gospel 
they will do." 

Baffled in the hope of finding a healthy 
situation for a permanent mission station near 
Linyanti, the final determination to make a 
way to the coast crystallised in his mind. 
*' I shall open up a path to the interior or 
perish," he writes, in his terse, decisive way 
to Dr. Moffat ; '* I never have had the 
shadow of a shade of doubt as to the 
propriety of my course." On November 8th 
he writes home to his father what he 
evidently feels may be his last will and testa- 
ment : * May God in mercy permit me to do 
something for the cause of Christ in these 
dark places of the earth. May He accept 
my children for His service and sanctify them 
for it. My blessing on my wife. May God 
comfort her! If my watch comes back after 
I am cut off, it belongs to Agnes. If my 
sextant, it is Robert s. The Paris medal to 
Thomas. Double-barrelled gun to Zouga. 
Be a father to the fatherless and a husband 



Ill DR. LIVINGSTONE 65 

to the widow for Jesus' sake," That was all. 
The Boers had relieved him of the necessity 
of willing any other belongings. He had 
none. The Chancellor of the Exchequer 
would not have made much out of the death 
duties on this property. 



CHAPTER IV 

Before we begin our journey with Living- 
stone to the coast, it will be well to pause 
and consider two things — firstly, the task 
proposed; and secondly, the equipment for 
the task, 

(i) The Task. Linyanti lies a hundred 
miles from the Zambesi river, at which the 
two possible routes may be said to fork. 
The one, eastward, was comparatively 
simple : it was to follow the great river 
some thousand miles to the sea. The other, 
westward, meant tracing the river towards 
the source so far as was possible, and then 
striking westward for St. Paul de Loanda, a 
matter in all of some fifteen hundred miles. 
Cape Town lay to the south, another fifteen 
hundred miles. These were the three spokes 
of the wheel from the centre at Linyanti. 

.66 



CH. IV DR. LIVINGSTONE 67 

Little was known to Livingstone of either 
the eastward or the westward route. He 
could only roughly estimate the distance. 
He had no notion what hostile tribes, what 
malarial swamps, what impenetrable forests, 
what waterless deserts might fall to be 
encountered. All that lay in the lap of 
destiny. He had not only to make this 
pilgrimage himself; he had to watch over 
the safety of his Makolol^ '*boys," keep 
them supplied with food and drink, and 
protect them in the event of attack by 
savages. The deadly *' tsetse " fly lay in 
wait for his oxen. The African fever lurked 
in ambush everywhere. In all times of 
extremity he had nothing to consult but his 
own stout heart and resourceful brain. 
Perils of floods and fevers, wild beasts and 
wilder human foes might be expected as a 
daily portion. Death would be almost a 
familiar companion. No love of adventure, 
no curiosity and fascination of exploration 
would have driven Livingstone through this 
self-imposed task. One has only to study 
his journal and listen to his simple, artless 



68 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

confessions of faith to see that at every step 
the Christian motive was supreme. He had 
sight of the ultimate City — the coming 
civilisation of Christ — and the lions of the 
way were all chained, and the dangerous 
rapids charmed. 

(2) The Equipment for the Task. Never 
was a journey of such heroic proportions 
undertaken with so simple an equipment. 
When one read^ of the elaborate preparations 
for modern expeditions not half so formidable 
one is amazed at the contrast. Many of my 
readers have probably seen the four tin 
canisters, fifteen inches square, that held the 
valuables. One contained spare shirts, 
trousers, and shoes to be used when civilisa- 
tion was reached. One was a medicine 
' chest. One a library. One held the magic 
lantern by means of which the Gospel story 
was to be preached. For the rest, there 
were twenty pounds of beads, value forty 
shillings, a few biscuits, a few pounds of tea 
and sugar, and about twenty pounds of coffee. 
There were five guns in all : three muskets 
for the natives who could use them, and who 



IV DR. LIVINGSTONE 69 

only hit things by accident ; a rifle and 
double-barrelled shot-gun for Livingstone, 
whose injured arm always made shooting 
difficult, and whose fever-shaken frame 
sometimes made it impossible. A bag of 
clothes for the journey, a small tent, a sheep- 
skin mantle, and a horse-rug to sleep on 
completed this equipment. The sextant and 
other instruments were carried separately ; 
and the amunition was ** distributed through 
the luggage," so that if any portion were lost 
some powder and shot would remain to them. 
Twenty-seven *'boys" were chosen for the 
westward journey ; and it is as well to set 
down the fact here that all the twenty-seven 
were brought back in safety to their homes. 

The expedition left Linyanti on the nth 
of November, 1853. Away in Europe the 
English and French fleets had entered the 
Bosphorus, and a delirious public opinion 
was hurrying Great Britain into the blunders 
of the Crimean War. Far away from all the 
** fool-furies '' of European politics, one single- 
minded Christian hero was setting his heart 
on the more renowned victories of peace and 



70 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

freedom, with nothing to sustain him but his 
own quenchless faith in God and the Right. 
Even at the start he had been severely 
shaken with fever, and much preaching had 
brought back an old troublesome complaint 
in the throat ; but these were personal 
inconveniences which he never allowed to 
deter him from any line of duty. The fare- 
wells were said with Sekeletu at Sesheke on 
the Zambesi, and the expedition passed away 
to the north-west into the great unknown. 

For the particulars of Livingstone's 
memorable journeys we are dependent on 
what he called his *' lined journal." It was a 
strongly bound quarto volume of more than 
eight hundred pages, and fitted with lock 
and key. The writing in it is extraordinarily 
neat and clear ; but there are pathetic pages 
in it when it is evident that the writer is 
shaking with fever, yet nevertheless his iron 
will is compelling his trembling fingers to do 
their office. Everything went down in his 
journal. Dr. Blaikie well says that *' it is 
built up in a random-rubble style.*' There 
are frequent prayers and poignant religious 



IT DR. LIVINGSTONE 71 

reflections^ the ejaculations of a heart charged 
to overflowing with the Divine love and 
human compassion. Immediately following 
will be scientific observations, or speculations 
on some problem of natural history or 
geological structure. The various incidents 
in the journey are all recorded with the sim- 
plicity and freedom from sensationalism of 
the Evangelist Mark. Livingstone never 
magnifies a peril, and dwells not at all on his 
personal heroism. The 'Mined" journal 
ranks as one of his *' books,*' and its com- 
panions in the little canister were only a 
Sechuana Pentateuch, Thomson's Tables, a 
Nautical Almanac, and a Bible. He con- 
fesses that *'the want of other mental 
pabulum is felt severely." 

A misfortune little short of a disaster befel 
him at the beginning of this journey. The 
greater part of his medicines were stolen. 
With the health of all his escort to see to, 
and with fever racking his own frame, it 
must have seemed as if the chances of 
success were sensibly diminished. 

It is interesting to compare Livingstone s 



72 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

rate of progress with that of ordinary 
traders. The trader thought seven miles 
a day good travelHng, and even so he only 
reckoned on travelling ten days a month. 
Seventy miles a month was, in his eye, satis- 
factory progress. Livingstone struck an 
average of ten miles a day, and travelled 
about twenty days a month. Thus he 
seldom made less than two hundred miles a 
month. He travelled from Linyanti to 
Loanda (some 1,400 miles) in six months 
and a half, which as a mere feat of rapid 
African transit was quite amazing. On this 
journey he rode hundreds of miles on the 
back of his riding-ox, Sindbad, whose temper 
was uncertain and whose idiosyncrasies were 
pronounced. We shall see as we proceed 
that Sindbad was by no means always a 
satisfactory colleague. 

Complications that might have led to ugly 
developments occurred while they were still 
in Sekeletu s sphere of influence and among 
his people. It was discovered that a party 
of Makololo had made a foray to the north, 
and had destroyed some of the villages of 



IV DR. LIVINGSTONE 73 

the Balonda, through whose country they 
were bound to pass. Some of the villagers 
had been seized for slaves, and Livingstone 
foresaw reprisals and the probability that 
prejudice would be excited against himself 
and his men. He therefore insisted that the 
captives should be restored, as a means of 
demonstrating that his errand was one of 
friendliness and peace. This act helped to 
disarm the hostility of the Balonda chief, and 
Livingstone afterwards busied himself to 
form a commercial alliance between the 
Balonda and the Makololo. It was always 
his policy to overcome the jealousies and 
hostilities of rival tribes, and substitute con- 
fidence based on mutual interest. After 
leaving the country of the Makololo, and 
while ascending the Barotse valley, the rains 
were almost incessant, and the expedition 
moved forward through clouds of vapour that 
hardly ever lifted. For a whole fortnight at 
a time neither sun nor moon was seen suffi- 
ciently to get an observation for latitude and 
longitude. The very tent that sheltered him 
by night began to rot with the excessive and 



74 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

incessant humidity. In spite of being kept 
well oiled, the guns grew rusty ; and the 
clothing of the party became ''mouldy and 
rotten." Part of the way lay through dense 
forest, and the axe had continually to be 
plied. The waters of the river were crowded 
with hippopotami, alligators, and at times 
with fish ; but it was not easy to get food in 
the forest, and repeatedly they were reduced 
to living on such roots as could be trusted, 
while moles and mice became a luxury. 
They were making now for the country of 
the great chief Shinte, whose fame had 
travelled far ; and early in the New Year of 
1854 found them at his capital, the most 
imposing town that Livingstone had seen in 
Central Africa. In the town were two 
Portuguese half-castes who were trading for 
slaves and ivory. *' They had a gang of 
young female slaves in a chain, hoeing the 
ground in front of their encampment." This 
was the first time that Livingstone s Barotse 
companions had seen slaves in chains. 
**They are not men," they exclaimed (meaning 
they are beasts), '^ who treat their children so." 



IV DR. LIVINGSTONE 75 

The explorer was received with great 
ceremony. Shinte sat on a '' sort of throne " 
covered with a leopard's skin, under a banyan 
tree. He must have presented a somewhat 
bizarre appearance, for Livingstone tells us 
** he had on a checked jacket and a kilt of 
scarlet baize edged with green. Strings of 
beads, copper armlets and bracelets hung 
about his neck and limbs. For crown he 
had a great helmet made of beads and sur- 
mounted with a huge bunch of goose feathers. 
The subsequent ceremony was as odd and 
elaborate as the chiefs wardrobe. There 
were terrifying manoeuvres of savage soldiers 
armed to the teeth. Livingstone suspected 
that their object was to cause him and his 
friends to take to their heels, but if so it was 
a failure. At last the new-comers were 
presented to the chief by the orator Sam- 
banza, who described Livingstone's exploits 
in great style, dwelt on the fact that he had 
brought back the captives taken by the 
Makololo, that he possessed '' the Word from 
Heaven," that he sought the peace of all the 
tribes, and was opening up a path for trade. 



76 DR. LIVINGSTONE ch. iv 

This speech was a great effort, and its effect 
was by no means minimised that the orator 
wore ** a cloth so long that a boy carried it 
after him as a train." It would appear that 
fashionable habits are the same all the world 
over. During his stay at Shintes court 
Livingstone suffered agonies from fever, 
accompanied by '' violent action of the 
heart.'' But he made his own invariable 
impression upon the chief by his frankness, 
independence and courtesy. He preached 
to the assembled tribesmen, and showed the 
magic-lantern pictures ; and he pleaded 
urgently with Shinte personally against the 
growing practice of slavery. When his stay 
was over Shinte gave him the last evidence 
of goodwill, for *' he drew from out his cloth- 
ing a string of beads and the end r^ a 
conical shell, which is considered in re[ ons 
far from the sea of as great value as the 
Lord Mayors badge is in London. He 
hung it round my neck, and said, * There 
now you Aave a proof of my friend- 
ship.' " Shinte also bequeathed to the ex- 
pedition his *' principal guide," Mtemese, 




PREACHING ON THE JOURNEY UP-COUJ^TRY. 
17 



78 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

who he promised would conduct them to 
the sea. 

Mtem^se proved to be by no means an 
immaculate person. Among other delin- 
quencies he left the pontoon behind, a loss 
that was keenly felt. He had, too, a preju- 
dice against speedy travel which Livingstone 
could not be induced to share. He was 
useful, however, in levying tribute of food 
throughout Shinte s dominion, and evidently 
thought Livingstone a great fool for paying 
a fair price for what could have been had for 
nothing. Gradually Shintes territory was 
left behind, and that of Katema was 
invaded. It seemed to Livingstone that as 
they moved north the moral conditions 
darkened. At times the great horror of 
heathenism laid hold of him. Everywhere 
was the same unrelieved tragedy of brutality 
and murder. Sometimes over the camp fires 
his savage hosts would exult in their customs. 
They told of the death oJF chiefs, and the 
slaughter of enough of their subjects to be 
an escort to the nether world. The further 
north Livingstone penetrated the more 



IV DR. LIVINGSTONE 79 

"bloodily superstitious'' did the people 
become. Yet he must eat with them, chat 
with them, laugh with them ; and the im- 
pression of such religious teaching as he 
could impart was, alas! so superficial. 
Katema proved peaceable; but his people 
lived under the perpetual shadow of the 
slave-trade, and would gladly have been 
taken away to the Makololo country. 

The beginning of March found them for 
the first time in hostile territory. There had 
been much rain and flood, wading and swim- 
ming. Livingstone himself had had an 
adventure that thoroughly alarmed his men, 
and served to evoke their real devotion. 
He was flung from his ox in midstream, and 
compelled to strike out for the opposite bank. 
There was a simultaneous rush on the part 
of all his men to rescue him. Their delight 
was unbounded when they found he could 
swim like themselves. ''Who carried the 
white man across the river but himself," 
they said afterwards. It was among the 
Chiboques that the expedition came nearest to 
having to fight for their lives ; and bloodshed 



8o DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

was only averted by Livingstone s wonderful 
patience and fearlessness. He sat on a 
campstool with his double-barrelled gun 
across his knees, and insisted on arguing 
with the chief who was endeavouring to 
levy blackmail. It was characteristic of 
Livingstone that he argued the legitimacy 
of passing through their country on the 
ground that the land belonged to God. If 
their gardens had been damaged compensa- 
tion would have been paid, but the earth is 
the Lord's. ** They did not attempt to 
controvert this," he comments, *' because it is 
in accordance with their own ideas." Finally 
he told them that if there was to be a fight 
they must begin it, and the guilt be on their 
heads. Matters looked critical for some 
hours ; but Livingstone's tact prevailed and 
the gift of an ox satisfied them for the time 
being. They had more trouble later before 
getting quit of the Chiboques, but there was 
no actual outbreak. There was thieving, 
however, of their goods, which were getting 
sadly reduced ; and the attitude of enmity 
and treachery added to the gloom of a very 



IV DR. LIVINGSTONE 8i 

gloomy forest through which a way had to 
be found. So thick was the atmosphere that 
the hanging creepers could not be seen, and 
again and again the riders were swept off the 
backs of the oxen. On one occasion 
Sindbad went off at a plunging gallop, the 
bridle broke, and Livingstone came down 
backwards on the crown of his head. At the 
same time Sindbad completed the triumph by 
dealing him a kick on the thigh. Livingstone 
makes light of all this, only remarking that 
** he does not recommend it as a palliative 
for fever." Repeated attacks of fever had 
reduced him to a skeleton. The sodden 
blanket which served as a saddle caused 
abrasions and sores. His ** projecting bones" 
were chafed on the hard bed at nights. He 
had enough burdens to bear without having 
to dare the threats of savages. At the last 
outpost of the Chiboque country their two 
guides turned traitors and thieves, and 
escaped with the larger portion of their beads, 
so necessary for barter. This was almost 
the last straw ; and there was mutiny among 
Livingstone s men, for they declared they 



82 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

would go home. He was in despair ; and 
having finally told them that in that case he 
would go on alone, he went into his little 
tent and flung himself upon his knees, *' with 
the mind directed to Him who hears the 
sighing of the soul." Presently one of the 
men crept into the tent. **We will never 
leave you," he said. *'Do not be dis- 
heartened. Wherever you lead we will 
follow." The others took up the chorus. 
They were all his children, they told him, and 
they would die for him. They had only 
spoken in the bitterness of their feeling and 
because they felt they could do nothing. 

They had one more parley with a bully- 
ing chief, but came out victorious, thanks 
to the opportune appearance of a young 
military half-caste Portuguese, who after- 
wards showed them every hospitality. More- 
over, they were now able to dispose of 
certain tusks of ivory presented to them by 
Sekeletu, the proceeds of which clothed the 
whole party and partially armed them. 

The journey was easy now, save that the 
intrepid leader had had twenty- seven attacks 



I 



IV DR. LIVINGSTONE 83 

of fever, and suffered one more humiliation 
at the hands of Sindbad, being compelled 
inadvertently to bathe in the Lomb^. He 
had to reassure his men as they drew near 
to the Atlantic, for they began to be troubled 
lest after all he should leave them to the 
cruel mercies of other white men. '' Nothing 
will happen to you but what happens to 
me," he told them. ''We have stood by 
one another hitherto, and will do so till the 
last." In course of time they crossed the 
sterile plains near Loanda, and gazed upon 
the sea. '*We marched along with our 
father," they said afterwards, ** believing that 
what the ancients had always told us was 
true, that the world has no end ; but all at 
once the world said to us, * I am finished, 
there is no more of me.'" 

It was a weak, worn, haggard figure that 
on the 31 St May, 1854, entered the city of 
Loanda, ''labouring under great depression 
of spirits." The fever had brought on 
chronic dysentery. He could not sit on 
his ox ten minutes at a time. His mind 
was "depressed by disease and care." His 



84 DR. LIVINGSTONE ch. iv 

heart misgave him as to his welcome. But 
he had finished his course. He had 
accompHshed his superhuman task. He 
had reached the coast. He had protected 
and guided his faithful company. He had 
robbed no man s goods and taken no man's 
Hfe ; and all the fourteen hundred miles 
he had preached the Gospel and argued 
for freedom and peace. 



CHAPTER V 

Livingstone found Loanda a very de- 
cayed town, but he did not fail to win 
many friendships. Mr. Gabriel, the one Eng- 
lishman in the place, was overwhelmingly 
kind, and the Roman Catholic bishop 
scarcely less so. English men-of-war were 
in the harbour also, keeping both eyes 
open for slave ships, and Livingstone was 
able to take his men on board and show 
them the cannon with which England ** was 
going to destroy the slave trade.'' He him- 
self recovered only very slowly from his 
condition of absolute emaciation, and in 
August had a severe relapse, which left 
him a mere skeleton. Everybody was kind 
to him, physicking him, and nourishing 
him, and, what was most of all valuable 

in his depression, providing him with lively 

85 



86 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

and interesting company. He fell in with 
their plans for him very gratefully, but on 
-one point he was adamant. They had 
wished to persuade him to go home and 
rest. The British captains offered him a 
passage to St. Helena. When this failed 
they urged him to take the mail-packet, 
the '* Forerunner," by which all his own 
precious diaries, and letters, and scientific 
papers, with maps and so forth, were to be 
sent. Despite his weakness it was not in 
him to be idle, and he had laboriously 
accomplished the writing of this big budget 
of despatches in time for the mail-boat. 
On April 23rd, 1852, he had told his wife 
that he would rejoin her in two years. It 
was now August, 1854, and his heart cried 
out for wife and children. But one thing 
stood in the way. He had promised his 
twenty-seven " boys " to take them back 
to their own country ; and they were there 
in Loanda on the faith of Livingstone's 
word. It did not consist with his sense of 
honour to leave them at Loanda, while he 
went home for a holiday, and he refused 



V DR. LIVINGSTONE 87 

all the tempting offers. The reward of 
honourable men does not always come as 
It came to him. The *' Forerunner " went 
down with all hands but one, and he 
escaped an almost certain fate because he 
kept his promise. But, alas ! all his precious 
papers, the fruit of so much labour, were 
destroyed ; and he had to take up the 
drudgery of doing everything over again. 
It was the form of toil most irksome to 
him ; but he just turned to and did it. It 
was his way. 

Fortunately he had not gone far on the 
homeward track when this news reached 
him, and there was no lack of hospitality. 
He was making a circuit round about 
Loanda to visit some of the more noted 
Portuguese settlements and estates, always 
with an eye to the better cultivation of the 
country and the interest of inland trade. 
The re-writing of his papers involved long 
and tedious delay, and there was more 
trouble through fever among his men. The 
year of 1855 dawned before he left a 
hospitable Portuguese home, and struck out 



88 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

along the old trail. It is worth while to 
remember here that whereas the expedition 
travelled from Linyanti to Loanda in six 
and a half months, it took twice that time 
to return. It was September, 1855, before 
they saw Linyanti again. 

The homeward journey was not devoid of 
incident and excitement. The passage 
through the Chiboque territory was once 
again troublesome. Just when Livingstone 
was most anxious to be himself, he fell a 
victim to rheumatic fever. For eight days 
he lay in his tent, tossing and groaning with 
pain ; and it was twenty days before he began 
to recover, and the old ambition to be on the 
march came back to him. His men 
objected, for he was too weak to move ; and 
at the physical crisis a quarrel broke out 
between his men and some of the Chiboques. 
A blow was struck, for which ample com- 
pensation was paid ; but with the leader on 
his back the importunities of the tribesmen 
increased, and matters became threatening. 
When a forward move was made, an 
organised attack on the baggage took place, 



V DR. LIVINGSTONE 89 

and shots were even fired, though nobody 
was hurt. It was then that Livingstone 
snatched up his six-barrelled revolver and 
*' staggered along the path'' till most 
opportunely he encountered the hostile chief. 
**The sight of the six barrels gaping into his 
stomach and my own ghastly visage looking 
daggers at his face seemed to produce an 
instant revolution in his martial feelings." 
He suddenly became the most peaceable 
man in all Africa, and protested his goodwill. 
Livingstone advised a practical illustration 
of this, and bade him go home. The Chief 
explained that he would do so, only he was 
afraid of being shot in the back! ''If I 
wanted to kill you," rejoined Livingstone, 
*'I could shoot you in the face as well." 
One of his men, afraid for Livingstone's own 
safety, advised him not to give the Chief a 
chance of shooting him in the back, where- 
upon Livingstone retorted, *'Tell him to 
observe that I am not afraid of him," and 
mounting his ox rode away triumphantly. 

Plodding steadily onward, they arrived on 
the 8th June at a spot famous for one of 



90 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

Livingstones most notable geographical 
discoveries, which he afterwards learned was 
actual confirmation of Sir Roderick Mur- 
chison^s theory, which the latter had worked 
out in his own arm-chair as the only one that 
would satisfy what was known of the African 
river systems, and the geological formation. 
Livingstone had just forded a wide river 
called the Lotembwa, only three feet deep, 
and had failed to remark in which direction 
it was flowing. He believed it to be the same 
river that flowed south from Lake Dilolo, but 
a Chief pointed out to him that this was not 
so, for the former river flowed north into 
the Kasai, one of the main tributaries of the 
Congo. The latter flowed south into the 
Zambesi. Livingstone now realised that he 
was "standing on the central ridge that 
divided these two systems " ; and what 
amazed him most was that these vast river 
systems had their rise, not in a chain of lofty 
mountains, but on flat plains not more than 
4,000 feet above the sea. 

The expedition now made slow and peace- 
ful progress along their former route, being 



V DR. LIVINGSTONE 91 

welcomed everywhere by their old friends 
with demonstrations of joy and astonishment. 
They distributed presents to all who had 
prospered them on their way, and left none 
but friendly memories behind them. When 
at the end of July they reached Libonta their 
progress became a triumphal procession. 
His men arrayed themselves in white 
European clothing, swaggered like soldiers, 
and called themselves his *' braves." During 
the time of service they sat with their guns 
over their shoulders. *' You have opened a 
path for us," said the people, '* and we shall 
have sleep." The ovations continued all 
down the Barotse valley. There were no 
drawbacks, except that many of the men 
found that during their absence some of their 
wives had sought and found other husbands. 
Livingstone advised them to console them- 
selves with those that remained. '' Even so, 
you have as many as I have," he reminded 
them. At Linyanti Livingstone found his 
waggon and belongings perfectly safe ; and 
some stores, and a letter a year old, from 
Dr. and Mrs. Moffat. Sekeletu's gratifica- 



92 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

tion knew no bounds. A grand new uniform 
had been sent him as a present from the 
coast, and when he wore it to church on 
Sunday it produced a greater impression 
than the sermon. It is worth remarking that 
Sekeletu at once began to set on foot a trade 
in ivory with the Portuguese at the coast, in 
fulfilment of Livingstone s policy. 

For eight weeks Livingstone remained at 
Linyanti. He found plenty to occupy him. 
He was once again the guide, philosopher, 
and friend to all the tribe. He had doctoring 
to do, and operations to perform. He found 
personal interviews on religious subjects 
more satisfactory than the public services, 
and he was now, as ever, supremely anxious 
that these people should owe their souls to 
his ministry. He had letters to write, and 
journals to transcribe, and new observations 
to make. He had all the odd jobs to do that 
had accumulated during his absence. He 
found Sekeletu a willing pupil in his ideas on 
commerce, and on the removal of the tribe 
to the healthier and wealthier Barotse valley. 
Especially he had to think out the problem 



r DR. LIVINGSTONE 93 

of his next great adventure to the East 
Coast. His inclination decidedly was to 
trace the course of the Zambesi to Quilimane 
and the sea. But against this was to be set 
the fact that it had an evil reputation for the 
savagery of some of the tribes along the 
banks. Certain Arabs whom he had met 
had strongly counselled him to strike up 
country to the North-East and make for 
Zanzibar by the south of Lake Tanganyika. 
The tribes were reported to be peaceable, 
and the villages and food supplies plentiful. 
If he decided to explore the Zambesi, the 
problem of the north or south shore was an 
important one. The north shore was 
reported to be very rocky and broken, and 
consequently specially difficult for transport. 

Either shore was likely to be dangerous to 
the oxen on account of tsetse fly. All these 
considerations had to be weighed, and the 
final decision was to risk the dangers of 
the tribes along the Zambesi, and to take the 
north shore, because on Livingstone's map 
Tette, the farthest inland station of the 
Portuguese, was marked as being on the north 



94 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

of the river. This turned out to be untrue. 
Having settled his course he made his pre- 
parations. Sekeletu proved himself a most 
magnificent ally. Livingstone s new escort 
was composed of a hundred and twenty men, 
with ten slaughter oxen and three of the 
best riding oxen. He was provided with 
stores of food, and given tribute rights over 
all tribes subject to Sekeletu. When we 
consider that Livingstone had no one to 
finance him, and that the success of his 
travels depended on the goodwill of native 
chiefs like Sekeletu, we begin to understand 
the unique influence which he exercised over 
the native mind. Those who knew him never 
failed him at a pinch ; they never deserted 
him in his need ; they lent their best aid to 
carry through his enterprises ; and gave him 
every tangible proof that can be given from 
one man to another of confidence, honour 
and love. 

Perhaps before we set out on this new 
journey, we may quote from Livingstone 
himself two passages illustrative of the 
secret of his influence. In the first he says, 



V DR. LIVINGSTONE 95 

** No one ever gains much influence in this 
country without purity and uprightness. The 
acts of a stranger are keenly scrutinised by 
both old and young, and seldom is the judg- 
ment pronounced even by a heathen unfair 
or uncharitable. I have heard women speak- 
ing in admiration of a white man because he 
was pure, and never was guilty of any secret 
immorality. Had he been, they would have 
known it, and, untutored heathen though they 
be, would have despised him in consequence." 
This illustrates Livingstone's favourite 
doctrine that it is the missionary's life that is 
the most powerful sermon. That his teach- 
ing was partially understood may be gathered 
from the story of Mamire, Sekeletus step- 
father, who on coming to say good-bye, used 
words like these : '' You are now going 
among people who cannot be trusted, because 
we have used them badly, but you go with a 
different message from any they ever heard 
before, and Jesus will be with you, and help 
you, though among enemies." It was a 
gracious and discerning God-speed. 

The route selected led Livingstone across 



> 



96 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

what we know to-day as Rhodesia, and 
which would have been much more appropri- 
ately named Livingstonia. It passed to the 
north of the land inhabited by the formid- 
able and dreaded Matabele. The tribes 
bordering on the Makololo country had no 
reason to love their oppressive neighbours ; 
and this fact had inspired the fears expressed 
in Mamire's words. It was on the 3rd of 
November, 1855, that the final departure from 
Linyanti was made ; and Sekeletu accom- 
panied the expedition along the first stage. 
He took the opportunity of howing Living- 
stone an extraordinary kindness, for the 
journey began in a terrific tropical thunder- 
storm. Livingstone's clothing had gone on, 
and there was nothing for it but to sleep on 
the cold ground. Sekeletu, however, took his 
own blanket and wrapped it about the 
missionary, lying himself uncovered through 
the chill night. '^ I was much affected,'' 
writes Livingstone, '* by this little act of 
genuine kindness. If such men must perish 
by the advance of civilisation, as certain races 
of animals do before others, it is a pity/ 



V DR. LIVINGSTONE 97 

It was no great distance to the famous 
falls, the rumour of which had often reached 
Livingstone, and which he was the first white 
man to visit. The falls were originally- 
called Shongwe. Sebituane used to ask 
Livingstone whether in his own country he 
had '' smoke that sounds," referring to the 
pillars of vapour, and the far-carrying roar 
of the river as it plunged into the chasm 
beneath. Sliding down the river in their 
canoes, they came to within half a mile of 
the falls, when some of the natives who 
were expert in the management of the 
rapids transferred Livingstone to a lighter 
canoe, and with practised dexterity guided 
it to the central island — the '* Goat Island " of 
the Zambesi Falls — *' on the edge of the 
lip over which the water rolls." This ad- 
venture can only be made when the river 
is low, but it was successfully accomplished, 
and Livingstone was able to gaze down 
into the fissure into which the great river 
plunges and apparently disappears. Then 
he saw that ** a stream of a thousand yards 
broad leaped down a hundred feet, and 



98 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

then became suddenly compressed into a 
space of fifteen or twenty yards." He 
spent many hours contemplating its beauties, 
noting all its fascinations, and pondering 
the scientific problem of its origin. He 
then permitted himself the only act of 
nationalism — ** personal vanity " he used to 
call it — that he ever indulged in. He 
changed the native name to that of the 
Victoria Falls in honour of the great White- 
Queen ; and returning to the island next 
day with Sekeletu he carved his initials 
and the date on a tree, and planted '' about 
a hundred peach and apricot stones and 
a quantity of coffee-seeds," with the remark 
that '*were there no hippopotami, he had 
no doubt this would be the parent of all 
the gardens which may yet be in this new 
country." 

Sekeletu now returned home, having 
provided a company of 114 men to carry 
the tusks to the coast, and the expedition 
set forth in a northward direction. Many 
wars had decimated the country, but there 
were ample evidences of the savagery of 



V DR. LIVINGSTONE 99 

the people. He found one old chief living 
in a house surrounded with human skulls, 
much like Giant Pope's cave in the '* Pil- 
grim's Progress." Many of the skulls were 
of mere children, slain by the chief s father 
''to show his fierceness.'* The Batoka 
tribe could be recognised because of their 
custom of knocking out the upper front 
teeth at the age of puberty, which gave 
them an uncouth appearance and a hideous 
laugh. He found them " very degraded " 
and much addicted to smoking *' the 
mutokwana," a pernicious weed which 
causes a species of frenzy, and which is 
often resorted to before battle as the native 
form of ** Dutch courage." 

On the 4th of December they had a fore- 
taste of coming peril, in the person of a 
howling dervish, who came at Livingstone 
with his lips covered with foam, and with a 
small battle-axe in his hand. *' I felt it 
would be a sorry way to leave the world, to 
get my head chopped by a mad savage " — 
but he would show no fear, and by and by 
the paroxysm of frenzy passed away. Later 



loo DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

on, they heard the tribesmen exulting over 
them. ''God has apportioned them to us/' 
they cried. Still there was no outbreak, and 
the expedition moved on unmolested. The 
country was now seen to be swarming with 
inhabitants. They had no notion of any 
invasion of their territory that did not mean 
conquest and plunder ; but when the 
villagers listened to Christ's promise of 
'' Peace on earth, goodwill to men/' they 
expressed satisfaction. " Give us rest and 
sleep/' they pleaded. The chief Monze, 
further on, was urgent that a white man 
should come and live among his people, and 
his sister seconded him, exclaiming that it 
would be joy '' to sleep without dreaming of 
anyone pursuing one with a spear." Living- 
stone must have felt like Dante with the 
vision of the Inferno before his eyes. 

They travelled on through a healthy and 
beautiful region, where Livingstone could 
indulge to the full his love of natural 
beauties, and study the habits of the wonder- 
ful beasts and birds. They kept well to the 
north of the Zambesi ; and the first organised 



V DR. LIVINGSTONE loi 

hostility awaited them at the confluence of 
the Zambesi and the Loangwa. There is 
no more striking or characteristic story than 
this in the whole of Livingstone s biography. 
The chief Mburuma had shown many signs 
of treachery, and had roused the countryside 
against the expedition. It seemed almost 
certain that the passage of the Loangwa 
would be contested. The people were 
collecting in large numbers, and remained in 
obstinate suspicion at a distance from the 
camp. Livingstone's own reflections are to 
be gathered from the entries in his Journal. 
On January 14th — for 1856 has come — he 
writes, ''Thank God for His great mercies 
this far. How soon I may be called before 
Him, my righteous Judge, I know not. . . . 
On Thy word I lean. The cause is Thine. 
See, O Lord, how the heathens rise up 
against me as they did against Thy Son." 
Then comes a very characteristic sentence : 
'* It seems a pity that the facts about the two 
healthy longitudinal regions should not be 
known in Christendom. Thy will be done." 
Later on in the evening the signs are even 



I02 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

more ominous. '' Felt much turmoil of 
spirit in view of having all my plans for the 
welfare of this great region and teeming 
population knocked on the head by savages 
to-morrow. But Jesus came and said, ' All 
power is given to Me in Heaven and on 
earth. Go ye therefore and teach all nations 
. . . and lo ! I am with you always, even 
unto the end of the world.* It is the word 
of a Gentleman of the most sacred and 
strictest honour and there is an end on't. I 
will not cross furtively by night as I intended. 
It would appear as flight, and should such a 
man as I flee ? Nay, verily, I shall take obser- 
vations for longitude and latitude to-night, 
though they may be the last. I feel quite 
calm now, thank God." The next day he 
superintended the crossing of the river, under 
the aegis of natives armed to the teeth, reserv- 
ing for himself the post of honour, the last 
man in the last canoe. He stepped in, 
pushed off, thanked the astonished savages, 
and wished them peace. Then ''passing 
through the midst of them, he went his way." 
They had never seen an enemy like this. 



V DR. LIVINGSTONE 103 

New perils arose in the country of the 
powerful chief Mpende ; and again Living- 
stone had little hope of avoiding a skirmish. 
But he succeeds in explaining that he is an 
Englishman, and shows them his white skin. 
" No/' said they, '' we never saw skin so white 
as that. You must be one of the tribe that 
loves the black men.'* He accepted the 
compliment, and when later he needed a 
canoe to take a sick man across the river, 
Mpende, exclaimed, ''this white man is truly 
one of our friends. See how he lets me know 
his afflictions." 

He was now on the south side of the river, 
and the natives were peaceful. The 2nd 
of March saw the expedition within eight 
miles of Tette, and Portuguese officers came 
forward to help and welcome him. He suc- 
ceeded in making arrangements for his 
Makololo to be cared for until his return, for 
he could now descend the river by boat to 
Quilimane. Nothing but death, he told them, 
would prevent his return. The leader of his 
escort, however, Sekwebu, he had resolved 
to take to England with him. The result 



I04 t)R. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

was tragic. The extraordinary experience 
of a sea voyage unhinged his reason ; and 
when Mauritius was reached, he sprang over- 
board and was lost. On December 12th, 
1856, David Livingstone reached Dover, 
having narrowly escaped shipwreck off the 
Bay of Tunis, and having crossed the Con- 
tinent from Marseilles to Calais. He had 
girdled Africa from West to East. He was 
universally recognised as the greatest of 
explorers. Well might Dr. Moffat write to 
him, *' the honours awaiting you at home 
would be enough to make a score of light 
heads dizzy, . . . You have succeeded 
beyond the most sanguine expectation in 
laying open a world of immortal beings, all 
needing the Gospel, and at a time, now that 
war is over, when people may exert their 
energies on an object compared with which 
that which has occupied the master minds of 
Europe, and expended so much money, and 
shed so much blood, is but a phantom." 
Livingstone^s own simple words are the best 
conclusion of this chapter : ** None has 
cause for more abundant gratitude to his 



V DR. LIVINGSTONE 105 

fellow-men and to his Maker than I have ; 
and may God grant that the effect on my 
mind be such that I may be more humbly 
devoted to the service of the Author of all 



our mercies." 



CHAPTER VI 

From the end of 1856 till March of 1859 
Livingstone was home. He had been 
parted from wife and children for five long 
years, and nobody realised more than he 
did what a burden of anxiety Mrs. Living- 
stone had carried all that while. One of his 
greatest sorrows was the death of his father, 
whom he had longed to see again, but who 
died during Livingstone's voyage home. The 
honours bestowed upon him were numberless. 
The freedom of the City of Glasgow and the 
City of Edinburgh, honorary doctors degrees 
from Oxford and Cambridge, and the Gold 
Medal of the Geographical Society were only 
a few of his distinctions. He wrote his book 
entitled *' Missionary Travels " in 1857, and 
It was a phenomenal success, the simple, 

direct, unassuming style being the most 

106 



CH. VI DR. LIVINGSTONE 107 

appropriate clothing for the thoughts and 
deeds of the man. It may be said that 
Livingstones writings were in a marked 
degree a revelation of his personality and 
character. You could not read the narrative 
without wondering at the achievements, and 
conceiving a personal affection for the author. 
In all parts of the kingdom there was 
extraordinary eagerness to see and hear him. 
The most distinguished people competed 
for the honour of entertaining him, the 
Universities showed exceptional enthusiasm, 
while in humbler places which had associa- 
tions with his fame the celebrations were 
touching in their love and pride. Much of 
the public laudation was distasteful to him, 
but he greatly enjoyed the intercourse now 
open to him with men and women of kindred 
spirit in all churches, and among all pro- 
fessions. One problem in regard to the 
future was settled in a characteristic way. 
Believing, as he did, that it was his life- 
mission to open up this great new country, 
and do pioneer work in the African interior, 
he felt that he ought to resign his position 



io8 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

under the London Missionary Society, as 
some of its supporters might not approve of 
this kind of work being undertaken by one of 
its agents. At the same time he was 
exceedingly anxious that the work of the 
Society should not suffer, and regarded it as 
his own duty to provide a substitute. 
Accordingly he arranged with his brother-in- 
law, Mr. John Moffat, to become a missionary 
to the Makololo, promising him ;^500 for 
outfit, and ;^i50 a year for five years as 
salary, besides other sums amounting in all 

to ;^I,400. 

His own immediate future was determined 
by the offer from Lord Palmerston of the 
post of Consul at Quilimane and Com- 
mander of an expedition for exploring 
Eastern and Central Africa. He was to 
take out a light paddle steamer suitable for 
the navigation of the Zambesi ; and his 
colleagues were to include a botanist, a 
mining expert, an artist, and a ship en- 
gineer. This offer was cordially accepted 
and all arrangements made for departure. 

There will always be some people, the 



VI DR. LIVINGSTONE 109 

victims of the water-tight compartment 
theory of life, who will hold that a man 
cannot be a minister or a missionary if he 
is anything else. These people believe that 
if a man becomes an explorer he ceases 
to be a missionary. To be consistent they 
ought to believe that when Paul practised 
as a tent-maker he ceased to be an apostle, 
or that a bishop becomes a secular person 
if he attends to his parliamentary duties. 
It is needless to say that Livingstone held 
no such impossible conception of the minis- 
try. He never at any time ceased to be 
a missionary. All his work was regarded 
by him as sacred, because it was done for 
the glory of God and the good of humanity. 
The ends that he pursued till the close of 
his life were essentially the same that he 
had sought hitherto — the Kingdom of God 
and His righteousness. 

One of the most impressive addresses 
delivered by Livingstone during this visit, 
and one which produced the most lasting 
effect, was to a distinguished University 
audience in the Senate House at Cambridge. 



Tio DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

It was a magnificent and irresistible appeal 
for missionaries. He was amazed that 
some of our societies had to go abroad to 
Germany for missionaries because of the 
lack of the missionary spirit at home. He 
repudiated the talk about sacrifice. He 
had made no sacrifice worthy to be men- 
tioned in the same breath as the Great 
Sacrifice made for mankind by Christ, He 
closed with this impressive appeal : ** I beg 
to direct your attention to Africa ; I know 
that in a few years I shall be cut off in 
that country, which is now open : do not 
let it be shut again ! I go back to Africa 
to try to make an open path for commerce 
and Christianity ; do you carry out the 
work which I have begun. I leave it with 
you ! 

It was by such glowing words as these 
that he enforced on English audiences his 
favourite theme that "the end of the geo- 
graphical feat is the beginning of the 
missionary enterprise." 

Fresh from the ovations and honours 
which reached their culmination in the 



VI DR. LIVINGSTONE in 

grand final banquet at the Freemason's 
Hall, at which foreign statesmen, dukes, 
earls, bishops, and scientific magnates vied 
with one another in celebrating his fame, 
Livingstone sailed from Liverpool on H.M. 
Colonial Steamer *' Pearl.'' Nothing had 
been wanting to his success. He was now 
rich, famous, powerful, the accredited re- 
presentative of the greatest Government in 
the world. Instead of having to provide 
for his journeys of exploration out of a 
meagre salary and the generosity of African 
chiefs, he had the wealth of England 
behind him and limitless goodwill. On the 
deck of the '' Pearl " were the sections of 
the little steam-launch *' Ma Robert," which 
a philanthropic firm had sold him "as a 
great bargain for the good of the cause,'* 
and which was the most ill-constructed, 
clumsy, and extravagant vessel that ever 
ruined the hopes of its owner. Going back 
with him was his wife and his youngest 
boy. His brother Charles, too, had been 
assigned to him as a colleague by a gener- 
ous Government. One of Livinsfstones 



112 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

first acts was to read to the members of 
the expedition the instructions drawn up by 
himself with the sanction of the Foreign 
Office. In these he laid stress on '* an 
example of consistent moral conduct,'* 
"treating the people with kindness/' "in- 
culcating peace and goodwill"; he ''earnestly 
pressed " upon the members *' a sacred 
regard to life," and the avoidance of wanton 
destruction of animals, and expressed the 
hope that arms would never be needed for 
defence against the natives, as ** the best 
security from attack consists in upright 
conduct." He insists on " the strictest 
justice in dealing with the natives," and an 
attitude of respect to the chiefs of tribes. 
" We are adherents of a benign, holy 
religion, and may by consistent conduct 
and wise, patient efforts become the har- 
bingers of peace to a hitherto distracted 
and down-trodden race.'' He concluded by 
again reiterating that " a kind word or deed 
is never lost." 

These instructions are very notable, and 
perhaps one may read between the lines 



VI DR. LIVINGSTONE 113 

some anxiety, and even apprehension, for he 
knew that the success of the expedition no 
longer entirely rested on himself, and might 
be marred by ill-advised and unchristian 
action on the part of any single member. It 
was well that he could not forecast the future. 
The years that were to elapse until his return 
to England in 1864 were in many respects 
tragic years. They were years of accumu- 
lated disappointments, bereavements, failures 
and rebuffs, faced with courage and borne 
with resignation, but none the less leaving 
upon his life the shadow of great and crush- 
ing sorrow which never wholly lifted. The 
course of the '' Pearl" was down the West Coast 
of Africa ; and the first bitter disappoint- 
ment was when his wife and son had to be 
left behind at Cape Town owing to ill-health. 
Fortunately, Dr. and Mrs. Moffat had 
journeyed down country to meet them, and 
took their daughter and her boy back to 
Kuruman. But '* it was bitter parting with 
my wife — like tearing the heart out of one." 
Livingstone was fated to do his work in 
loneliness. 



114 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

The " Pearl " reached the mouth of the 
Zambesi on May 14th, 1858. She was 
anchored in the *' mangrove swamps," a 
deadly place for fever, and Livingstone 
insisted on the small launch, ** Ma Robert," 
being fitted together immediately, for he 
feared the consequences to the newcomers If 
they did not speedily get away to a healthier 
locality. This meant working on Sunday, 
for which if life can be saved there is sound 
Scripture warrant ; but the order created no 
small criticism. ** It is a pity," writes 
Livingstone, **that some people cannot see 
that the true and honest discharge of every- 
day life is divine service." The next trial 
was in the resignation of the naval officer, a 
matter in regard to which Livingstone was 
fully exonerated by the F'oreign Office, but 
which none the less brought home to him 
the difficulties of his new position. Instead 
of waiting for a new officer, Livingstone 
proceeded to run the ship himself. *' It was 
imagined we could not help ourselves," he 
wrote later, '' but I took the task of navigat- 
ing on myself, and have conducted the 



DR. LIVINGSTONE 115 

steamer over 1,600 miles, though as far as 
my likings go I would as soon drive a cab 
in November fogs in London as be * skipper ' 
in this hot sun ; but I shall go through with 
it as a duty/' 

There was some genuine compensation 
when he reached Tette, and was hailed with 
delirious delight by his old Makololo friends, 
who had never ceased to believe that he 
would keep his word to them. '* The Tette 
people often taunted us by saying, *Your 
Englishman will never return ' ; but we 
trusted you, and now we shall sleep/' 
Disease and fighting had thinned their ranks. 
Thirty had died of smallpox and six had 
been killed. Livingstone had some work to 
do before he was ready to march back with 
the survivors to Linyanti, but they knew he 
would not fail them. Already it was clear 
that the '* Ma Robert '' was almost useless. 
Livingstone had applied to the Government 
for a more suitable vessel ; and had also 
ordered one on his own account. He had 
intended to spend ;^2,ooo, but eventually he 
devoted nearly the whole of the profits of his 



ii6 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

book, some;^6,ooo, to the purchase of the little 
steamer *' Lake Nyassa," which he specially 
destined for the lake whose name she bore, 
but whose waters she never sailed. The 
Government acceded to the request, but the 
*' Pioneer " did not arrive till early in 1861, 
and the '* Lake Nyassa " a year later, the 
latter vessel having then to be put together, 
which occupied many months^ 

There were two years, therefore, to be de- 
voted to what explorations were possible with 
the aid of the '' Ma Robert *' — now frivol- 
ously called the '* Asthmatic" — and their own 
exertions. It was clear to Livingstone that 
the Shire river, a tributary of the Zambesi 
out of the north country, was a very im- 
portant feature, and ought to be thoroughly 
examined. It was quite possible that it 
might prove to be a highway to the inland 
lakes of which rumour reached him. So the 
first months of 1859 were devoted to this 
journey. The party made their way up till 
they were stopped by cataracts, which were 
named the. Murchison Falls. Little could be 
done among the natives, who were very sus- 



VI DR. LIVINGSTONE 117 

picious and armed with poisoned arrows. It 
was necessary constantly to assure them that 
the expedition was not Portuguese, but 
English, for the terror of slave-raids was like 
a perpetual nightmare over the people. A 
second attempt on the Shir6 two months 
later had more notable results. They were 
inspired to strike away from the river to the 
east, and discovered Lake Shirwa. The 
lake lay 1,800 feet up, and was sixty miles 
long. It is remarkable that the Portuguese 
had no idea of its existence. Livingstone 
describes its remarkable beauty and the 
grandeur of its setting among the mountains, 
some of which rise to the height of 8,000 
feet — ''much higher than any you see in 
Scotland," he writes to his little daughter 
Agnes. He is increasingly impressed that 
the whole region is suitable for cotton and 
sugar. The land is '*so rich that the grass 
towers far over ones head in walking." 

The party went back to the mouth of the 
Zambesi for stores, and then returned to 
make a determined effort to find Lake 
Nyassa. 



ii8 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

Passing beyond the cataracts, they were 
assured by a chief that the river Shird 
'* stretched on for two months, and then 
came out between perpendicular rocks which 
could not be passed." ** Let us go back to 
the ship," said the Makololo who were with 
them, ''it is no use trying to find this lake." 
'' We shall see the wonderful rocks, at any 
rate," said Livingstone. '' Yes," they 
grumbled, '' and when you see them you will 
just want to see something else." However, 
the curiosity of the Englishmen was by this 
time thoroughly aroused, and they pushed 
forward till, on the i6th of September, they 
discovered Lake Nyassa. They had not time 
to do much by way of exploration, and two 
years were to elapse before Livingstone 
returned and satisfied himself that the lake 
was at least two hundred miles long, and that 
it had endless possibilities in view of future 
colonisation. But even now the slavers were 
active ; and gangs of unfortunate captives 
were being marched to the coast, greatly to 
the indignation of the Makololo, who 
wondered why Livingstone would not let 



VI DR. LIVINGSTONE 119 

them " choke " the marauders ; but he was 
occupied with more heroic measures, that 
would lay an axe to the roots of the Upas- 
tree. The highlands of the Shir^, the fertil- 
ity and healthiness of the country, and the 
proximity to the great waterway, together 
with the lake stretching two hundred miles 
to the north, filled his brain with schemes for 
colonising the district. It is the best white 
man s country he has seen, and he bombards 
his English friends with letters on the subject. 
Why should honest poor folk at heme make 
a miserable pittance by cultivating small 
crofts of land when here is a vast undeveloped 
country waiting for their occupation, with the 
well-being and safety of a large population to 
be secured by their presence ? He is per- 
sonally prepared to embark two or three 
thousand pounds in such an enterprise. ''It 
ought not to be looked on as the last shift a 
family can come to, but the performance of 
an imperative duty to our blood, our country, 
our religion, and to human kind." 

While waiting the response of England to 
these appeals, he is off with his Makololo for 



I20 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap, 

six months, to see them back to tlieir land 
and to their folks. Some have perished, as 
we have seen ; some had no wish to return. 
About thirty of them deserted before they 
had gone far, leaving about sixty to go for- 
ward. Livingstone's white companions were 
his brother and Dr. Kirk, afterwards Sir 
John Kirk, who had proved himself an 
invaluable friend and comrade. 

As for the great traveller himself, it was 
with real joy that he found himself on the 
old trail, marching and camping in the 
fashion so reminiscent of earlier days. There 
are the same tasks and toils, the same fight 
with hunger and fatigue and fever ; but it 
cheers his heart : '* He rejoiceth as a strong 
man to run his course." At times, however, 
he is compelled to realise how hard it is to 
do good and not do evil with it. He has 
opened up a path; and the first to follow 
him is the Portuguese or Arab slave-dealer. 
He feels that he has been made the instru- 
ment of the undoing of some innocent people, 
and his heart is heavy. Only Christian 
settlements can defeat these sinister enter- 



VI DR. LIVINGSTONE 121 

prises. In August they were at the Victoria 
Falls, and most unexpectedly find a white 
man there, Mr. Baldwin by name, who has 
news of a great tragedy that fills Living- 
stone s soul with sorrow. One of the results 
of his missionary appeals in England had 
been that the London Missionary Society 
had resolved on a mission at Linyanti. Nine 
Europeans set out for this spot, and Mr. 
Baldwin had helped them on the way. But 
the head of the mission, Mr. Helmore, and 
his wife had perished of fever, and three 
others succumbed later, so that the survivors 
gave up in alarm and retired. Livingstone 
was too late to be of service, though he was 
certain his remedies might have saved their 
lives. Even this is not all, for poor Sekeletu 
is stricken with leprosy, and is living away 
from his people, believing himself to be 
bewitched. His joy, however, at Living- 
stone's return is unbounded, and the general 
happiness does something to make up for the 
sad news by which all have been depressed. 
He is cheered also to hear that his old friend 
Sechele was doing well, and happy in the 



122 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

possession of a Hanoverian missionary, and 
in the progress of Christian teaching. It 
was with evident satisfaction that Living- 
stone, British Consul, resumed his old labours 
of preaching and teaching. It could not be 
for long, for he had to be back on the 
Zambesi, but he could not neglect any 
opportunity of doing definitely spiritual 
work. They reached Tette once more on 
November 23rd, and travelled down the river 
in the '' Ma Robert," the last voyage of that 
ill-fated ** bargain." A month later she 
grounded on a sandbank and filled, and with- 
out remorse they left her at the bottom of 
the Zambesi. 

To Livingstone it seemed that 1861 was 
to mark the opening of a new era, for the 
long-expected steamer '' Pioneer '* arrived at 
the end of January, and with it Bishop 
Mackenzie and his staff, whose object was to 
plant the " Universities' Mission," another 
fruit of Livingstone's memorable home visit. 
Livingstone liked the Bishop from the first 
for his manly character, his devotion, and his 
common-sense. Differences of denomination 



VI DR. LIVINGSTONE 123 

affected him not at all. He ''looks upon 
all godly men as good and true brethren." 
He thought the Bishop like Dr. Moffat '' in 
his readiness to put his hand to anything." 
Some time was lost in exploration of the 
river Rovuma, which came to nothing. Then 
the navigation of the Shir6 with the 
** Pioneer" proved very slow and laborious 
because of low water and sandbanks. Worse 
than all, the whole country seemed to have 
been ravaged by the slavers ; and it was 
evident that the Portuguese Government 
officials were in active connivance. At the 
village of Mbame on the Shir6 Livingstone 
and the Bishop liberated a gang of eighty- 
four men and women, and attached them to 
the Mission Settlement. A peculiarly 
murderous native chief, the head of a fierce 
tribe called the Ajawa, was doing the deadly 
work for the Portuguese, and when a visit 
was paid to him to persuade him to desist, 
he fired on the mission party, and the fire 
was returned. It was an ominous beginning 
of an enterprise that had tragical develop- 
ments. It was difficult for the Bishop to 



124 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

remain a spectator of all these murderous 
onslaughts, but Livingstone strongly advised 
him not to interfere in tribal quarrels if he 
could avoid it. A little later the Bishop 
returned to the ship, and assured Livingstone 
that the Ajawa were more peaceably disposed. 
The latter heard the report with suspicions 
that proved well-founded. The Bishop went 
back to his station, and Livingstone's 
thoughts were turned to the prospective 
arrival of the man-of-war that was to bring 
his own new vessel, the *' Lake Nyassa," as 
well as his wife, the Bishops sister, and 
some more members of the mission. The 
ship was spoken at the end of January, and 
among other passengers was the Rev. James 
Stewart, afterwards so well known as Dr. 
Stewart of Lovedale. He had come to 
represent the United Free Church of Scot- 
land, and survey for a mission station. 
The Bishop had not appeared to meet his 
sister, and boats were despatched up river to 
find him. Miss Mackenzie and Mrs. 
Burrup, the wife of one of the Bishop's 
colleagues, went with the boats. What they 



VI DR. LIVINGSTONE 125 

actually found was the well-authenticated 
story that the Bishop and Mr. Burrup were 
dead of fever, after an expedition to rescue the 
captive husbands of some Manganja women. 
The blow to Livingstone was a crushing one, 
for though he had never been able wholly 
to approve the policy of the mission, he was 
too chivalrous to criticise in such an hour, 
and declared that had he been with the 
Bishop he might have done the same. 
**This will hurt us all," he said prophetically, 
as the two sorrow-stricken women came back 
to Shupanga with the terrible tidings. He 
knew well that the Portuguese would mis- 
represent the object of missionary settle- 
ments to be to interfere among the tribes, 
and even to make use of military force, so 
adding to the mischief instead of abating it. 
** We must bow to the will of Him who doeth 
all things well," he writes ; *' but I cannot 
help feeling sadly disturbed in view of the 
effect the news may have at home. I shall 
not swerve a hair's-breadth from my work 
while life is spared.*' 

Some weeks were spent in arranging for 



126 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

the return of the bereaved women, who did 
not sail for home till April 2nd. Meanwhile 
an even darker cloud of sorrow was prepar- 
ing to break over Livingstone. His wife had 
only returned to him to die. She had been 
to Kuruman, where their youngest child was 
born. Then she had returned to Scotland to 
see the other children. But her longing to 
be at her husband s side was intense, and at 
last she had come back to him. On April 
2 1 St she was taken ill with fever, and on the 
evening of Sunday, 27th, in the presence of 
Dr. Stewart and her husband she sank to 
rest. Dr. Stewart tells us how he found 
Livingstone '* sitting by the side of a rude 
bed formed of boxes, but covered with a soft 
mattress, on which lay his dying wife." For 
the first time in his life Livingstone says he 
would be content to die. He laid her to 
rest under a baobab tree on " Shupanga 
brae.^' His diary reveals the agony of his 
heart. Henceforth '* the red hills and white 
vales " of Shupanga are with him in all his 
wanderings. ** In some other spot I may 
have looked at, my own resting-place may be 



VI DR. LIVINGSTONE 127 

allotted. I have often wished that it might 
be in some far-off still deep forest, where I 
may sleep sweetly till the resurrection morn." 
" I loved her when I married her, and the 
longer I lived with her the more I loved her. 
. . . Oh ! my Mary, my Mary, how often we 
have longed for a quiet home, since you and 
I were cast adrift at Kolobeng; surely the 
removal by a kind Father who knoweth our 
frame means that He rewarded you by taking 
you to the best home, the eternal one in the 
Heavens." 

For such comfort as could be obtained in 
such dark days he turned again to his work. 
The fight against slavery is becoming more 
and more desperate. Even the navigation 
of the river is now a horror. The waters 
are ghastly with corpses. ** The paddles had 
to be cleared of bodies caught in the floats at 
night." Human skeletons were found in all 
directions. ** Many had ended their misery 
under shady trees, others under projecting 
crags in the hills, while others lay in their 
huts with closed doors which, when opened, 
disclosed the mouldering corpse with the 



128 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

poor cloth round the loins, the skull fallen off 
the pillow, the little skeleton of the child that 
had perished first rolled up in a mat between 
two large skeletons." Eighteen months 
before, this was a well-peopled valley, now it 
is a desert *' literally strewn with human 
bones." To complete his despair the mission 
of Bishop Mackenzie is removed, by order, 
to Zanzibar, despite Livingstones urgent 
entreaty ; and finally, in July, 1863, he himself 
received from Lord Russell the news that he 
was recalled. He does not blame the Gov- 
ernment. He has expected this. But the 
bitterness is that *' 900 miles of coast are 
abandoned to those who were the first to 
begin the slave-trade, and seem determined 
to be the last to abandon it.'* 

His instructions as to handing back the 
*' Pioneer " to the Government men were quite 
explicit, and it was clear that he had little 
time left in Africa. Yet before he returned 
to England he accomplished two feats that 
would have made the reputation of any other 
man. With only one white colleague and 
five Makololo he marched seven hundred and 



VI DR. LIVINGSTONE 129 

sixty miles in fifty- five days, getting to within 
ten days' march of Lake Bangweolo or 
Bemba, and the village of Ilala, where years 
later his own heart was to be buried. He 
would have reached the lake but for the duty 
of fulfilling his instructions from the Govern- 
ment. The second great feat was on the 
ocean. He had to face the problem of his 
own admirable little steamer, the ** Lake 
Nyassa." She had cost him a fortune and he 
needed the money. He could have sold her 
as a slave-vessel, but sooner than do that he 
would sink her in the Indian Ocean. After 
many adventures he gets her to Zanzibar, but 
cannot get a fair price. The one chance left 
is to sail her across the Indian Ocean and 
sell her in Bombay. It was the wildest 
adventure, but it was worthy of him. He 
could take but fourteen tons of coal, and the 
distance was 2,500 miles. The crew con- 
sisted of himself, a stoker, a carpenter, and a 
sailor, seven native Zanzibarians, and two 
**boys," one of whom was Chumah, who was 
with him on his last march. The voyage 
took forty-five days, much of it marked by 



130 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

dead calm, but the latter part by furious 
squalls. The sails were torn, and the little 
boat nearly rolled right over. But ** God's 
good providence" is **over us," and on 
June 13th, 1864, they creep into the harbour 
through the fog, their entrance being un- 
observed. 

He stays in Bombay a short time, interest- 
ing the merchants in East African trade. 
Then he takes ship for England, where he 
arrived on July 21st. 

The Livingstone who thus returned for 
his last visit home was in some respects 
a very altered man from the one who took 
England by storm at the close of his first 
great explorations. He had suffered severe 
personal losses. His wifes death had left 
him lonely and sad, with the deep and 
lasting sadness of a strong nature. His 
grief and disappointment over the tragedy 
of the Universities* Mission had left their 
mark upon him. But two experiences had 
changed his outlook even more radically. 
In the first place he had seen the limitations 
inseparable from the life of a Government 



VI DR. LIVINGSTONE 131 

official. His position as a Consul had not 
helped him, while at the same time it had 
made his attitude towards the Portuguese 
more difficult He could not be his own 
free and independent self when the relations 
of two European Powers were at stake. 
His recall was something of a relief. He 
was now unmuzzled : and gentle and kindly 
as his spirit was, Livingstone was capable 
of what we may dare to speak of as '*the 
wrath of the Lamb.'' It becomes more 
and more evident during this visit that 
his heart had turned back in full affection 
to his original vocation and work as a 
missionary ; and when the next negotia- 
tions were opened up with him, he bluntly 
avows his determination to return only on 
the condition that he may pursue his travels 
in that capacity. The second experience 
was, of course, his full contact with all the 
indescribable villainies of the slave trade. 
He had seen enough of the miseries it 
involved during his journey to Loanda ; 
but the West Coast was vigilantly watched 
by English cruisers, and the slave trade 

K 2 



132 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

reduced to comparatively small proportions. 
On the East Coast, Portugal was in 
authority ; and her connivance and sym- 
pathy were responsible for the vast extent 
of the operations of the raiders. Living- 
stone came back to England in the grip 
of a great and noble passion — a fiery in- 
dignation against the barbarities of this 
traffic in flesh and blood ; and he sternly 
resolved to fight it single-handed if need 
be. He had no heart to pursue purely 
scientific observations or geographical ex- 
plorations to gratify the intellectuals, while 
Africa was being desolated and her popula- 
tion laid waste. The great public might 
complain that he no longer tickled their ears 
with thrilling or amusing descriptions of 
adventures : he was, as Mr. Thomas Hughes 
truly said, *'a great Puritan traveller," and 
the moral ends of his labours remained 
with him ever supreme. With such a fire 
consuming him, it may easily be realised 
that he found the Foreign Office ''cold." 
The year was 1864. America was washing 
out the guilt of centuries in the blood of 



VI DR. LIVINGSTONE 133 

her bravest and best. Livingstone's own 
boy, Robert, who had been somewhat 
erratic, had heard his call, and was fight- 
ing in the Federal ranks on his way to 
a grave in Gettysburg Cemetery. Never 
in the history of the world had slavery 
revealed itself so convincingly as a hideous 
cancer in the social system. But official 
England was ''cold.'* She had begun by 
believing that Jeff Davis was making a 
nation ; she had reached the stage of chill 
condescension towards Abraham Lincoln, 
for whom Livingstone had a true man's 
admiration and affection. The Foreign 
Office was in no mind to take an heroic 
line, and was, no doubt, heartily relieved 
that Livingstone had not made a greater 
fuss about his recall. 

It was not to make a fuss about his per- 
sonal affairs, however, that Livingstone had 
come home. The *'fuss'' was to be about 
his friends, the natives, who were being done 
to death in thousands, and the residue sold 
into degradation and for: ad labour. He 
opened the battle in a lecture to the British 



134 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

Association at Bath ; and so effective an 
opening was it, that the Portuguese had to 
put up Senhor Lacerda, the traveller, to 
declare that it was ** manifest that Dr. 
Livingstone, under the pretext of propa- 
gating the Word of God, and the advance- 
ment of geographical and natural science," 
was bent on robbing Portugal of the 
** advantages of the rich commerce of the 
interior." ** Rich commerce" is good! 
The learned Senhor goes on to urge that 
Livingstone s *' audacious and mischievous 
actions" ought to be ''restrained." This 
was a pretty plain hint to the Portuguese 
authorities, and not lost on them, as we shall 
see. The next move in the war lay with 
Livingstone. This was the book in which 
he proposed to lay the whole scandal bare. 
He wrote this book at Newstead Abbey, the 
home of his hospitable friends, Mr. and Mrs. 
Webb, the former of whom was a noted 
African hunter. The day he finished his 
book was the day when Lincoln was assassin- 
ated in Washington. 

The book finished, he was to settle a 



VI DR. LIVINGSTONE 135 

question which Sir Roderick Murchison had 
raised with him, of a return to Africa for 
purely geographical purposes. Livingstone 
is all eagerness to return, and the line of 
exploration suggested on the inland lakes 
appeals to him strongly, but he answers that 
he can only feel in the way of duty by 
working as a missionary. He writes to Mr. 
James Young, ** I would not consent to go 
simply as a geographer, but as a missionary, 
and do geography by the way, because I feel 
I am in the way of duty when trying either 
to enlighten these poor people, or open their 
land to lawful commerce.*' Later on came 
an informal request from Lord Palmerston to 
know what he could do for him. It may be 
doubted whether that decidedly worldly 
statesman ever anticipated so disinterested a 
reply as he received. Instead of bargaining 
for salary or pension, Livingstone replied 
that he wanted but one thing ; ** free access 
to the highlands by the Zambesi and Shire 
to be secured by a treaty with Portugal.** 
Governments find those men easiest to deal 
with who are satisfied with a lump sum down. 



136 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

In the interval of fixing up his arrange- 
ments with the Government and the Royal 
Geographical Society, Livingstone had a 
personal sorrow in the death of his mother at 
the age of eighty-two. He was glad, how- 
ever, to be at home to fulfil her wish that 
*' one of her laddies should lay her head in 
the grave." After that, he visited the school 
which his children attended, and made a 
short speech. The last words he uttered in 
public in Scotland were the simple ones, 
'* Fear God and work hard." 

The negotiations in regard to his new 
work were finally completed. The Govern- 
ment gave ;^500, and the Royal Geo- 
graphical Society an equal sum. A private 
friend added a thousand pounds. This was 
all, €xcept that he was to be the unsalaried 
Consul with power over the chiefs on the 
coast between Portuguese territory and 
Abyssinia. He was also warned to expect 
no pension. It is useless now to indulge in 
belated indignation over these very unhand- 
some terms. Probably if they were put into 
plain black and white they meant that the 



VI DR. LIVINGSTONE 137 

great British Government presented David 
Livingstone with ;^500 and a sphere of 
influence to keep him from making mischief 
with the Portuguese by expressing honest 
British hatred of the slave trade ; while the 
Geographical Society hoped to tie him up to 
geographical work, and so prevent him wast- 
ing his time and talents on fatuous missionary 
enterprises. What actually happened we 
shall see in due course. Meanwhile Living- 
stone s own personal plan was to sell his 
steamer at Bombay in order to make up the 
deficiency in the cost of his new expedition 
due to the financial economy of a lukewarm 
Government. It was for Bombay accord- 
ingly that he departed in August, 1865. He 
never saw these shores again. 



^ -• • 



CHAPTER VII 

When Livingstone arrived in Bombay in 
September, Sir Bartle Frere was Governor. 
They were old friends, and the Governor 
became his very sympathetic host. His 
immediate purpose was to dispose of the 
** Lake Nyassa " for what she would fetch. 
This proved to be ;^2,6oo, for a steamer 
that had cost him ;^6,ooo. It was a poor 
bargain, but he was not in a position to refuse 
it, and as things turned out he got no good 
out of it. He deposited the money in an 
Indian bank which in a few weeks failed 
miserably, and Livingstones money was 
seen no more. As he cared for money less 
than any man, he did not allow himself to be 
unduly depressed by this misfortune. '* The 
whole of the money she cost,'' he wrote, 

" was dedicated to the great cause for which 

138 



cH.vii DR. LIVINGSTONE 139 

she was built : we are not responsible for 
results." His preparations in Bombay for the 
forthcoming expedition were, for him, quite 
elaborate ; and we may add at once gave 
little satisfaction in the sequel. There is a 
training school under Government for 
Africans at Nassick. Nine of the men 
volunteered to go with him. Besides these, 
he was supplied with sepoys from the 
** Marine Battalion." He was assured that 
they had been accustomed to rough it in 
various ways. In practice they would only 
march five miles a day, were '* notorious 
skulkers," and disgusted Livingstone by their 
cruelty to the brute beasts. It was not long 
before he dismissed them to their homes. 
The Nassick *' boys "were not much more 
manageable. The expedition included ten 
Johanna men who were only a moderate 
success, two Shupanga men — including Susi 
— and two Wayaus — including Chumah. Susi 
and Chumah, it will be remembered, were 
with him at the last. Chumah was a liberated 
slave who owed his freedom to Livingstone 
and Bishop Mackenzie in 1861. The expc- 



I40 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

dition was further distinguished by a number 
of animals imported by Livingstone from 
India : six camels, three buffaloes and a 
calf, two mules and four donkeys. He 
was anxious to prove that camels were 
immune from the bites of the tsetse flies, and 
he expected to acclimatise the other beasts, 
and teach some native chief to breed them. 
The Sultan of Zanzibar was cordial, and 
armed Livingstone with a letter to be used 
as a passport. Then he took his leave, and 
on the 22nd of March he is at the mouth of 
the Rovuma with all his caravan complete. 
The navigation of the shallow river proved 
unexpectedly difficult, and occasioned tedious 
delay and some anxiety ; so at last he sails 
north again and gets all his animals landed 
in Mikindany Bay. He is too old a traveller 
not to realise that his troubles are all in front 
of him ; but he does not anticipate them ; 
and writes in high spirits of the joy of setting 
out once more into wild and unexplored 
country. 

As David Livingstone is now starting on 
his last and greatest march, which was to be 



vii DR. LIVINGSTONE 141 

lengthened out year after year, and to be 
signalised by unparalleled sufferings and 
heroic endurance, it will be well to acquaint 
ourselves with such plans as he had some- 
what vaguely laid down. He realised that 
there are three great main waterways into 
the African interior : the Congo, the Zambesi, 
and the Nile. He was satisfied that no 
future exploration could do other than 
confirm his conclusions as to the watershed 
which he had traversed, from which certain 
rivers flowed north to the Congo, and certain 
others south to the Zambesi. But from 
earliest times the scientific imagination had 
been captured by the problem of the sources 
of the Nile. This was the greatest of all 
unsolved geographical problems ; and to it 
Livingstone was attracted irresistibly, not 
only by his own native curiosity, but by that 
interest in classical questions which was a 
very marked characteristic of his mind. To 
this problem he knew that the system of 
inland lakes was the clue, and that whoever 
could completely explore them would settle 
the question for all time and " make himself 



142 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

an everlasting name." That he would have 
numberless opportunities of proclaiming 
Christ to the scattered peoples of the 
interior, and would cut across the slave 
routes and perhaps be able to scheme out 
how to defeat the devilish purposes of the 
slavers, were motives with him even more 
powerful. So he got his caravan under way, 
marched south to Rovuma, and then south- 
west across the four hundred miles of country 
that lay between the coast and Lake 
Nyassa. 

The first stages were made miserable to 
Livingstone by the brutality of the sepoys to 
the dumb beasts. They were overloaded 
and overstrained and cruelly maltreated. 
Some of them die of sores, which the sepoys 
insist are caused by tsetse or by accidents. 
Meanwhile progress is depressingly slow ; 
the district through which the expedition 
passes is famine-stricken, and food is most 
difficult to obtain. The sepoys go from bad 
to worse, and in two months are openly 
mutinous. They kill one camel, beating it 
over the head ; and set themselves to corrupt 



VII DR. LIVINGSTONE 143 

the Nassick boys so as to tire Livingstone 
out. For weeks together it is nothing but 
one endless struggle on the part of the leader 
against this conspiracy to defeat his plans. 
Sometimes he tries the offer of increased 
wages ; sometimes the threat of corporal 
punishment, but the indolence, cruelty, and 
illwill of the sepoys threaten the success of 
the expedition, and the spirit of disaffection 
spreads to the Nassick boys. 

It is the 19th of June: "We passed a 
woman tied by the neck to a tree and dead. 
The people of the country explained that she 
had been unable to keep up with the other 
slaves in a gang ... I may mention here 
that we saw others tied up in a similar 
manner, and one lying in the path, shot or 
stabbed, for she was in a pool of blood.'' 
They were on the red trail now, and Living- 
stone's feet never left it till death brought 
him release. 

On the 27th of June they found "a 
number of slaves with slave-sticks on,. 
abandoned by their masters from want of 
food ; they were too weak to be able to 



144 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

speak or to say where they had come from ; 
some were quite young." 

The middle of July found them in Mataka's 
country, with whom Livingstone made fast 
friends. The town lay in an elevated valley 
surrounded by mountains ; and food was 
plentiful, so that they were able to make up 
for many privations. It was here that 
Livingstone resolved to send the sepoys 
back. They had become quite intolerable — 
shirking work, stealing, and infecting all the 
company with their ill-nature. One of the 
incidents that most pleased Livingstone 
during his stay with Mataka was the release 
by the chief of a large company of slaves. 
The expedition left for Lake Nyassa on 
July 28th. It was mountainous travelling 
now, but the country between them and the 
lake was under Mataka, and his guides were 
sworn to take them safely. Progress was 
still slow, though decidedly more pleasant in 
the absence of the sepoys. Sometimes they 
came on Arab encampments, where the 
slaves were herded in great pens — from 300 to 
800 form a gang, according to Livingstone's 



VII DR. LIVINGSTONE 145 

estimate. As they drew near the lake, food 
was plentiful and game abundant. On August 
8th, *' we came to the lake at the confluence 
of the Misinj6, and felt grateful to that 
Hand which had protected us thus far on our 
journey. It was as if I had come back to 
an old home I never expected again to see ; 
and pleasant to bathe in the delicious waters 
again, hear the roar of the sea, and dash in 
the rollers ... I feel quite exhilarated." 
It had taken four months to reach Lake 
Nyassa from the coast. 

Livingstone's plan had been to cross the 
lake by means of Arab dhows, and resume 
explorations on the west side. But the Arabs 
fled from him as from the plague, and took 
every care that no dhows were at his dis- 
posal ; so he was driven to march round to 
the foot of the lake, where he was again on 
familiar ground, and utters anew his lamenta- 
tions over the untimely end of the Universi- 
ties' Mission, which he had always seen in 
his mind s eye standing sentinel over this 
great inland sea, and holding the country for 
Christ and freedom. 



146 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

The end of September finds the expedi- 
tion on the Shir^ ; and now rumour reaches 
them of wars and troubles ahead, which 
causes the Johanna men to desert in a 
body, and Livingstone does not indulge in 
many regrets. They were *' inveterate 
thieves ; " but he is left with a party in- 
conveniently small. The sequel to this 
treachery on the part of the Johanna men 
was that, to justify themselves, they in- 
vented and circulated a most plausible and 
circumstantial story of Livingstone's murder 
— a story which imposed upon many of his 
friends and produced a crop of laudatory 
obituary notices in the papers. The story 
was as thoroughly disbelieved by Living- 
stones old friend, Mr. E. D. Young, who 
well knew how the leader of these men 
could lie. Mr. Young came out to Africa 
at once, bringing with him a steel boat, 
the ** Search," which, by the aid of some 
Makololo men, was successfully trans- 
ported to Lake Nyassa and floated there. 
Mr. Young effectually disproved the Johanna 
legend, and in eight months was back 



VII DR. LIVINGSTONE 147 

again in England, having discovered that 
Livingstone had passed safely on toward 
the north-west. 

The depleted expedition found itself now 
in very mountainous regions, and enjoyed 
the noble prospects afforded from many of 
the high plateaux which they reached. 
Their faces were to the north, towards the 
Loangwa River and the distant Lake 
Tanganyika. No opportunity is lost by 
the way of preaching to all the tribes 
**our relationship to our Father; His love 
for all His children ; the guilt of selling 
any of His children — the consequence : 
e,g,y it begets war, for they don't like to 
sell their own, and steal from other villages, 
who retaliate." Going west from the lake 
they followed a very zigzag course, crossing 
many rivers which flow into the Lintipe, 
which is one of the main supplies of Lake 
Nyassa. They kept to the north of the 
fine Zalanyama range, and pushed on in 
a north-westerly direction. All the while 
a state of fear existed in regard to the 
dreaded Mazitu, who were reported to be 



148 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

making forays, and whom Livingstone 
compared to the Highland Celts in the 
twelfth century in the Border country. By 
the middle of December they had reached 
the Loangwa, and crossed it in search of 
food. Christmas Day was spent wretchedly, 
the goats having been stolen, and Living- 
stone s favourite milk-diet being at an end. 
A ridge of mountain country has to be 
crossed, after which they are compelled to 
bear to the east in search of food, which 
has become very scarce again, and all the 
party are suffering. The last day of 1866 
is sacred to some new resolutions : *' Will try 
to do better in 1867, ^^^ be better — more 
gentle and loving ; and may the Almighty, 
to Whom I commit my way, bring my 
desires to pass and prosper me. Let all 
the sin of '66 be blotted out for Jesus' 
sake." 

January \st, 1867. — *' May He who was 
full of grace and truth impress His character 
on mine. Grace — eagerness to show favour ; 
truth — truthfulness, sincerity, honour — for 
His mercy's sake." 



VII DR. LIVINGSTONE 149 

The year opens with '' a set-in rain." He 
records that he feels always hungry, and is 
constantly dreaming of better food when he 
should be sleeping. On the loth he takes 
his belt up three holes to relieve hunger. On 
the 15th he suffers the loss of his *'poor 
little dog, Chitane," to which he was greatly 
attached. Everywhere it is famine, and 
famine prices for wretched food. They boil 
grain and pretend it is coffee. The ground 
is all sloppy — feet constantly wet. The 
natives are living on mushrooms and leaves. 
Then comes the crowning disaster. Two 
men who had joined the expedition deserted, 
and absconded with the medicine chest. It 
was in the midst of the forest and there was 
not the shadow of a chance of recovering it. 
There is little doubt that the lack of any 
proper medicines to counteract the fever 
poison was a main contributory cause to 
Livingstone s serious loss of health. '* I felt 
as if I had now received sentence of death, 
like poor Bishop Mackenzie," he writes. 
Yet even in the hour of despair he searches 
for some support for optimism, and the Pro- 



ISO DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

vidential order which he knows to exist. 
" This may turn out for the best by taking 
away a source of suspicion among more 
superstitious, charm-dreading people further 
north." On January 23rd he remarks that 
**an incessant hunger teases us . . . real, 
lasting hunger and faintness." Yet next day 
it was a case of '^ four hours through un- 
broken, dark forest." But they have reached 
the Chambez6 now, lean and starved and 
desperate, and there is prospect of food on 
the other side. They found the food a little 
later, but '^ in changing my dress this morn- 
ing I was frightened at my own emaciation." 
The expedition made a lengthy stay with 
the chief, Chitapangwa, who on the whole 
treated them well, and sent men to set them 
on their way to Lake Tanganyika, The 
same steady tramp, tramp continues. Always 
we seem to hear what Dr. Isaac Taylor 
described as '' the forward tread . . . which 
means getting there " ; but it is terrible work. 
He has had rheumatic fever again ; and no 
medicine! On March loth he writes: ''I 
have been ill of fever . . . every step I take 



VII DR. LIVINGSTONE 151 

jars in the chest, and I am very weak ; I can 
scarcely keep in the march though formerly 
I was always first ... I have a constant 
singing in the ears, and can scarcely hear the 
loud tick of the chronometers." Still he will 
go on with the rest ; and at last, on the first 
day of April, they are at Tanganyika, or, as 
it is called at the southern end. Lake Liemba. 
It has been good marching under the most 
trying conditions. The veteran traveller has 
gone from the south of Lake Nyassa to the 
south of Lake Tanganyika in six months. 
Ill as he is, he is deeply impressed by the 
loveliness of the scenery. Mountains run- 
ning up to 2,000 feet surround the southern 
portion, '*and there, embosomed in tree- 
covered rocks, reposes the lake peacefully in 
the huge cup-shaped cavity.'* Again he 
writes : '' It lies in a deep basin whose sides 
are nearly perpendicular, but covered well 
with trees : the rocks which appear are 
bright red argillaceous schist : the trees at 
present all green : down some of these rocks 
come beautiful cascades, and buffaloes, ele- 
phants, and antelopes wander and graze on 



152 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

the more level spots." It is an enchanted 
country ; but the getting there has, in the 
absence of medicines, nearly killed him. 
** I feel deeply thankful at having got so far. 
I am excessively weak and cannot walk 
without tottering, and have constant singing 
in the head. But the Highest will lead me 
furthery After a few days spent at the 
lake, Livingstone's illness assumes a most 
alarming form. He has ** a fit of insensi- 
bility," finds himself ''floundering outside the 
hut and unable to get in," and finally falls 
back heavily on his head. The boys carried 
him in, but hours passed before he could 
recognise where he was. 

He is a little better a fortnight later, and 
anxious to move on. But whither? He 
had intended to follow the lake to the 
north-west ; but the road seems barred by 
the Mazitu, who are out for plunder. He 
has heard of Lake Moero, which lies to the 
west some two hundred, or two hundred and 
fifty miles. Is it not possible that this lake 
may be the common source of the Congo and 
the Nile? The geographical problem is 



VII DR. LIVINGSTONE 153 

most persistent, and he cannot be satisfied to 
leave Lake Moero unexplored. On the first 
day's march he has another fit of insensi- 
bility, but this does not constitute an 
argument for delay. He reached the village 
of a chief Chitimba, only to find that the 
country between him and Lake Moero is the 
scene of a small war, which would involve 
**a long detour round the disturbed district." 
He decides to wait events, which turns out 
to be a tedious business ; but the Arabs are 
kind to him, and the enforced leisure is 
probably beneficial. His diary is full of 
descriptions of the cruelties inflicted by the 
slave-trade. In all, he was detained at 
Chitimba s village nearly three months and a 
half. In his onward march he visits the 
famous Nsama, with whom the war has been 
waged, and is again laid up with illness in 
that neighbourhood. After this, he crosses 
the Chisera and the Choma, and then ascends 
the high lands between the rivers and the 
northern part of the lake. It is exhilarating 
travelling here, for Livingstone is always 
pleasantly excited by beautiful and hilly 



154 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

scenery which brings back memories of 
Scotland. But, alas ! ** the long line of slaves 
and carriers " is a frequent incident in the 
march. On the 8th of November, he reaches 
Lake Moero, *' which seems of goodly size, 
and is flanked by ranges of mountains on the 
east and west." There he sleeps in a fisher- 
man s hut, for the lake abounds in fish, the 
fishermen enumerating thirty-nine varieties. 
The end of November finds him at the town 
of Casembe, where he meets an Arab trader, 
Mohamad Bogharib, **with an immense 
number of slaves," who gives Him a meal — 
the first honey and sugar he had tasted for 
fourteen months — and is useful to him in 
many ways. The chief also is civil to 
Livingstone ; but has been guilty of hateful 
barbarities, as the mutilated arms and ears of 
many of his people bear witness. Living- 
stone looks with disgust on the executioner 
who carries sword and scissors for his horrible 
work. The people generally are more 
savage than any he has seen. 

The results of extended explorations of 
Lake Moero, lasting for some months, are set 



VII DR. LIVINGSTONE 155 

forth in a despatch to Lord Clarendon, dated 
the loth of December, 1867. From this 
despatch we can see that Livingstone had 
been misled by a similarity of name to 
imagine that Lake Bemba, of which he had 
heard years before, was the same as Lake 
Liemba. He now knows that Lake Liemba 
is only the southern portion of Lake Tan- 
ganyika ; and that Lake Bemba is the lake 
otherwise called Lake Bangweolo ; and that 
on his northern travels from Lake Nyassa, 
when he crossed the River Chambeze, he had 
been less than a hundred miles from this 
latter lake, and might have saved himself 
many a hundred miles of trudging had he 
explored it first of all. He had discovered 
also, that a great river, the Luapula, flows 
from Lake Bangweolo into the south of 
Lake Moero, and that at the north the 
waters flow out in what is called the River 
Lualaba. He is uncertain in his own mind 
what this great river Lualaba is, and whither 
it goes. It may be the Nile ; it seems more 
probable that it is the Congo. It may flow 
into the northern portion of Lake Tan- 



156 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

ganyika, or it may flow away to the north- 
west. Livingstone is assured by the natives 
that Lake Bangweolo is only ten days 
distant. But he adds, '* I am so tired of 
exploration without a word from home or 
anywhere else for two years, that I must go 
to Ujiji on Tanganyika for letters before 
doing anything else. Besides, there is 
another reason — I have no medicine." He 
is satirical on the subject of the published 
maps, one of which tacks on 200 miles to 
Lake Nyassa, and another makes a river 
— ** the new Zambesi " — flow 4,000 feet up 
hill ! *' I have walked over both these 
mental abortions and did not know that I 
was walking on water till I saw them in the 
maps." 

The year 1868 finds him still interested in 
Lake Moero. His New Year s prayer is : 
" If I am to die this year, prepare me for it.*' 

It was towards the end of March that the 
idea of going south and exploring Lake 
Bangweolo took hold on him. His reason 
was that at least two more months must be 
passed at Lake Moero before a passage could 



VII DR. LIVINGSTONE 157 

be made to Ujiji. There were many diffi- 
culties in the way, notably that his stores 
were nearly done and he could not give 
presents to chiefs on the way. What was 
more serious was that those on whose help 
he counted were in open revolt against his 
plan. Mohamad Bogharib, who intended to 
accompany him to Ujiji, was incensed at 
Livingstone for making a proposal so mad ; 
and the latter expresses the fear that he must 
give up Lake Bangweolo for the present. 
Next day, however, he is bent on going, but 
his own carriers have been corrupted by the 
Arabs, and refuse to accompany him. Only 
five of his men remain loyal ; but Living- 
stone s blood is up now, and he starts out at 
the head of this meagre escort to find Lake 
Bemba or Bangweolo. *' I did not blame 
them very severely in my own mind for 
absconding," he writes; *'they were tired 
of tramping, and so verily am I." They 
might well resent Livingstone's decision, for 
at the time it was taken they were at the north 
end of Lake Moero, where Livingstone had 
gone to look at Lualaba, examine the country. 



158 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

and draw his conclusions as to whether this 
great river was the Congo or the Nile. The 
way to Tanganyika and Ujiji was now open, 
and this sudden turn south was almost more 
than flesh and blood could stand. However, 
the leader was obdurate, and early in May, 
with his faithful few, he is back at Casembe s, 
to the south of Moero, with his mind fully 
made up for Bangweolo. Again there were 
tedious delays, and it is the second week in 
June before he is definitely off for the south. 
A month s travelling brings him to Lake 
Bangweolo. A Babisa traveller asked him 
why he had come so far, and he answered 
that he wished to make the country and 
people better known to the rest of the world ; 
that we were all children of one Father, and 
that he was anxious that we should know 
each other better, and that friendly visits 
should be made in safety. He began 
exploring the islands of the lake. It was 
bitterly cold on one of them, and the shed 
where he slept was decidedly airy, but he 
tells us that he was soon asleep and dreamed 
that he had apartments in Mivart s Hotel ! 



VII DR. LIVINGSTONE 159 

At the end of July he started back, and at 
Kizinga he deviated from his former route 
and struck out to the north for the Kalongosi 
River. All goes well, and by the first of 
November he is back again at the north of 
Moero, preparing to march to Ujiji, and 
intently preoccupied with the problem of the 
Nile. The men who had deserted him when 
he went south are now pleading to be taken 
back. He reflects that '*more enlightened 
people often take advantage of men in similar 
circumstances," and adds characteristically, 
** I have faults myself." So all the runaways 
are reinstated. 

The expedition would have got away now 
without further delay but that the slave raids 
of Mohamad Bogharibs men roused the 
countryside against him, and Livingstone 
found himself at the very centre of a small 
war, and literally in the zone of fire. Stock- 
ades were hastily erected, and the perpetrators 
of the outrage had to stand a siege. Horrible 
scenes were witnessed, and Livingstone 
comments on the miseries which this devilish 
traffic entails. The country is now very 



i6o DR. LIVINGSTONE ch. vii 

disturbed and unsafe, and it is not till 
December nth that a start can be made, 
Mr. Waller describes the ''motley group" 
that now set out for Tanganyika : ''Mohamad 
and his friends, a gang of Unyamwezi 
hangers-on, and strings of wretched slaves 
yolked together in their heavy slave-sticks. 
Some carry ivory, others copper or food for 
the march, whilst hope, and fear, misery and 
villainy may be read off the various faces." 
Livingstone is now an actual eye-witness of 
a slave march. The slaves constantly 
escape. Sickness and accidents pursue the 
miserable cavalcade, and make progress 
slow. Food for so many mouths is difficult 
to obtain. Christmas Day passes in a land of 
scarcity. The weather is very damp and 
cheerless ; and on New Year s Day Living- 
stone, as he says, got wet through once too 
often. Yet he is so anxious to be on the far 
side of the Lofuko that he wades through, 
though it is waist deep and very cold. This 
is the last straw. He breaks down utterly, 
is " very ill all over ; cannot walk ; pneu- 
monia of right lung, and I cough all day 




THE TRAGEDY OF CENTRAL AFRICA. 



i6i 



i62 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

and all night ; sputa rust of iron, and bloody ; 
distressing weakness." He chronicles the 
illusions that come and go ; sees himself lying 
dead on the way to Ujiji, ^nd all the letters 
waiting for him useless. It seems as if he is 
near the end. Mohamad Bogharib constructs 
a kind of litter for the helpless veteran, and 
in this litter he is carried forward four hours 
a day. It is the best that can be done.; but 
Livingstone tells of the pain he endured as 
he was jolted along, sometimes through steep 
ravines and sometimes' over volcanic tufa, the 
feet of the carriers being at times hurt with 
thorns, and the sun beating down on Living- 
stone's face and head, which in his weakness 
he could not even shelter with a bunch of 
leaves. For six endless weeks the sufferer 
was borne onward thus, and on February 
14th all that is left of him is deposited on 
the shore of Lake Tanganyika, and canoes 
are sought to transport the party up the lake 
to Ujiji. It was stormy weather on the lake, 
and the canoes had to creep along the 
western shore from village to village — 
** Patience was never needed more than now," 



rii DR. LIVINGSTONE 163 

writes the sick man in his extremity — then 
across the lake to the east, and at last, 
March 14th, the heroic traveller reaches his 
goal, and does actually stand for the first 
time in the streets of Ujiji. He had fixed so 
many hopes on this Arab settlement, and had 
lived for so long on the anticipation of letters 
and journals, stores and medicines, that the 
disappointment awaiting him was heart- 
rending. He had reached a den of thieves, the 
vilest he had ever known. His stores were 
plundered — only eighteen pieces of cloth out 
of eighty remained, and what was harder to 
bear, only one old letter out of all that had been 
sent to him. As for the medicines, he is told 
they are at Unyanyembe, thirteen days to the 
east. He knew quite well that there was a 
conspiracy to thwart him, and if possible to 
drive him out of the country or compass his 
death. He was fighting the slave trade single- 
handed, and was ringed around by cruel and 
unscrupulous enemies, whose dark deeds had 
only him to fear. He is almost beaten in 
the unequal strife ; almost, but never quite. 
No man was ever yet quite beaten who is as 



1 64 DR. LIVINGSTONE ch. vii 

sure of Christ as he was. He has one thing 
to rely on, as he said before — '* the word of a 
Gentleman of the strictest honour " — and it is 
enough. So he will remain and outwit the 
slave-traders if he can. And yet it is a 
misnomer to call it a *' trade " ; ''it is not a 
trade, but a system of consecutive murders." 
He did not know, though he suspected, 
how helpless he was in the hands of the 
Arabs. His bitter cry could not reach 
England. Forty letters he wrote, and paid 
handsomely for their delivery, but the Arabs 
took care they should never reach the coast. 
He was literally *'cut off" in the interior. 
He heard nothing from Europe, and Europe 
heard nothing of him. A few weeks at Ujiji 
were enough. Then, all unfit as he was, he 
starts out again for the country in the north- 
west, the land of the Manyuema, and the 
great river Lualaba, the direction of which it 
is his main purpose now to determine. He 
still believes it is the Nile. 



CHAPTER VIII 

When Livingstone crossed Tanganyika 

again to the west and disappeared into the 

new country, he certainly did not propose to 

himself more than an eight or nine months' 

absence. In reality he left Ujiji on July 12th, 

1869, and saw it no more until October 

23rd, 187 1. For two years and a quarter 

he wandered on, while the great world 

believed him to be dead ; and, perhaps, if we 

had to name one period of his life which was 

more poignant and more fruitful than any 

other, it was this. For out of its agonies a 

new hope was born for humanity. His 

health returns somewhat as he goes on, 

though many signs remind him that he is not 

the man he was. He is only fifty-six, but he 

is worn out with hardship and privation. 

He cannot walk up-hill without panting for 

16s 



1 66 DR, LIVINGSTONE chap. 

breath. His cheeks are hollow, and his 
teeth are broken, or have fallen out, from 
trying to masticate hard and sticky food. 
"If you expect a kiss from me," he writes to 
his daughter Agnes, '* you must take it 
through a speaking-trumpet ! " 

The 2 1 St of September sees him at 
Bambarr6, the capital of the Manyuema 
country, noting with thankfulness that as he 
perseveres his strength increases. In front 
of him is the Luamo River, flowing west to 
its confluence with the Lualaba, which again 
is not far distant. He might have fulfilled 
his ambition to navigate the Lualaba now, 
but could get no canoes — '' all are our 
enemies' " — and so returned reluctantly to 
Bambarre. It was from Bambarr6 that he 
wrote two letters — they were probably posted 
months later — which actually got through 
the Arab cordon, and eventually reached 
their owners. One was to his son Tom. 
He tells of his hopes to go down the Lualaba ; 
but he has frightful ulcers on his feet *' from 
wading in mud." Another to Sir Thomas 
Maclear, which is more explicit as to his 



VIII DR. LIVINGSTONE 167 

plans. " I have to go down and see where 
the two arms unite — the lost city Meroe 
ought to be there — then get back to Ujiji to 
get a supply of goods which I have ordered 
from Zanzibar, turn bankrupt after I secure 
them, and let my creditors catch me if they 
can, as I finish up by going outside and 
south of all the sources, so that I may be 
sure none will cut me out and say he found 
other sources south of mine. ... I have 
still a seriously long task before me." To 
his daughter Agnes, whose courage he never 
failed to praise, he writes : '' The death 
knell of American slavery was rung by a 
woman's hand. We great he-beasts say 
Mrs. Stowe exaggerated. From what I 
have seen of slavery I say exaggeration is 
a simple impossibility. I go with the sailor 
who, on seeing slave-traders, said : 'If the 
devil don't catch those fellows we might as 
well have no devil at all.' " 

After Christmas he goes away to the 
north, and discovers the Chanya range. 
Marching through rank jungle, and suffering 
much from fever, and '' choleraic symptoms," 



1 68 DR. LIVINGSTONE ch. viii 

he turns south again, and on the 7th of 
February goes into winter quarters at 
Mamohela. Mohamad is still with him, but 
goes off at this stage in search of ivory. 
The entries in his diary are now few, but on 
June 26th the winter season is evidently over 
and he proposes to start once again for the 
Lualaba. Once more, however, he has to 
reckon with a revolt of his men, who desert, 
with the exception of three, among whom 
are the ever-faithful Susi and Chumah. The 
path this time is to the north-west. It 
is difficult and hazardous, but the situation 
is relieved by the timely arrival of Mohamad 
Bogharib. It was well, for Livingstone was 
at the end of his strength. '' Flooded 
rivers, breast and neck deep, had to be 
crossed, and the mud was awful." His feet 
•* failed him *' for the first time in his life. 
*' Irritable, eating ulcers fastened on both 
feet." In indescribable pain, he ''limped 
back to Bambarr^." This was on July 22, 
1870. 

For the next eighty days he was a prisoner 
in his hut. He could do nothing but think, 




"I READ THE BIBLE THROUGH FOUR TIMES WHILST I WAS IN 

MANYUEMA." 

169 



I70 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

read the Bible, and pray. He read the 
Bible through four times during his stay in 
the Manyuema country. He was fascinated 
by the personality of Moses and his con- 
nection with the Nile ; and thinks favourably 
of the legend that associates him with the 
lost city, Meroe, at the junction of the two 
rivers Lualaba. He meditates tenderly on 
the stratagem of the ''old Nile" hiding its 
head so cunningly, and baffling so many 
human efforts. One of his resources is the 
Soko, a kind of gorilla, often made captive. 
It is physically repulsive to him, but it 
interests him as a naturalist ; and later on he 
becomes possessed of one, which he pets and 
proposes to take back to Europe. When 
most helpless he sketches out his future ; and 
in imagination names certain lakes and rivers 
after old English friends and benefactors — 
Palmerston, Webb, and Young ; and one 
lake after the great Lincoln. On the loth 
of October, he is able for the first time to 
crawl out of his hut. On the 25th he makes 
this significant entry in his journal : '' In this 
journey I have endeavoured to follow with 



VIII DR. LIVINGSTONE 171 

unswerving fidelity the line of duty. All the 
hardship, hunger and toil were met with 
the full conviction that I was right in 
persevering to make a complete work of the 
exploration of the sources of the Nile. The 
prospect of death in pursuing what I knew 
to be right did not make me veer to one side 
or the other.'* Never had any man a better 
right to use such words. 

He is waiting now for the arrival of Syde 
bin Habib, Dugumb^, and others who are 
bringing him letters and medicines from 
Ujiji. Months pass and there is no sign of 
them. He is heartsick and weary with the 
intolerable delay. The one excitement is in 
the shedding of blood. Every day has its 
story of horrors, and he can bear it no longer. 
But there are to be darker tragedies yet 
before he escapes out of the Manyuema 
country. 

The year 1871 dawns. **0 Father! 
Help me to finish this work to Thy glory." 

It was February before the men arrived 
who were bringing letters and stores for him ; 
but, alas ! ''only one letter reached, and forty 



172 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

are missing." The men, too, have been 
corrupted by the Arabs, and refuse to go 
north with him. He is again outwitted by 
his cunning foes. Weary days of bargaining 
follow, and at last terms are arranged. The 
expedition starts, and on March 29th Living- 
stone is at Nyangwe on the bank of the 
Lualaba, the furthest point westward that he 
was to reach at this time. He finds the 
Lualaba here ''a mighty river 3,000 yards 
broad." 

Livingstone was to learn to his cost that 
the men who had been sent up country to 
him, ostensibly to help him on his way, were 
his worst enemies. They poisoned the 
minds of the Manyuema against him. They 
stirred up strife, and were guilty of every 
kind of crime. All Livingstone's efforts to 
get canoes for exploring the river were 
neutralised by them ; though he afterwards 
saw in this the hand of God for his deliver- 
ance, for other canoes were lost in the rapids. 
'' We don't always know the dangers we are 
guided past." 
. We now reach the event which was the 



snii DR. LIVINGSTONE 173 

climax of Livingstone s moral sufferings, and 
which, when known in Europe, sent a thrill 
of horror through the nations which had 
heard of the lesser agonies of the slave traffic 
with comparative indifference. On the 28th 
of June, one of Syde bin Habib's slaves, 
named Manilla, set fire to eight or ten 
villages, alleging an old debt by way of an 
excuse. He then made blood-brotherhood 
with other tribes, which angered Dugumbe 
and his followers, who planned revenge. 
The 15th of July was a lovely summer day, 
and about 1,500 people came together for 
the market. Livingstone was strolling round 
observing the life in the market place, when 
three of Dugumbes men opened fire upon 
the assembled crowd, and another small 
troop began to shoot down the panic-stricken 
women as they fled to the canoes on the 
river. So many canoes were pushed off at 
once down the creek that they got jammed, 
and the murderers on the bank poured volley 
after volley into them. Numbers of the 
victims sprang into the water and swam out 
into the river. Many were hit and sank ; 



174 DR. LIVINGSTONE ch. viii 

others were drowned. Canoes capsized and 
their occupants were lost. The Arabs 
reckoned the dead at four hundred ; and 
even then the men who had tasted blood 
continued the awful butchery and fired 
village after village. '* No one will ever 
know," writes Livingstone, *' the exact loss 
on this bright, sultry, summer morning ; it 
gave me the impression of being in hell." 
Dugumbe protested his innocence, and 
helped to save some who were drowning ; 
but it is clear that Livingstone in his heart 
accuses him of complicity. He counted 
twelve burning villages ; and on the next 
day sees as many as seventeen. " The 
open murder perpetrated on hundreds of 
unsuspecting women fills me with unspeak- 
able horror." It " felt to me like Gehenna," 
he writes later ; and the nightmare never 
left him afterwards. " I cannot stay here 
in agony," he adds ; and on the 20th he 
starts back for Ujiji, in spite of the entreaties 
of those who had every reason to desire that 
he should not go away and publish the story. 
The atrocious wickedness of the Arabs was 




K7fi 



176 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

that they demoralised their slaves, and 
trained them to perpetrate these butcheries 
of natives, and then excused themselves on 
the ground that they had nothing to do with 
the crime. 

The homeward march lay through miles 
of villages, all burned ; and it was impossible 
to convince the wretched survivors that he 
himself had not been guilty. Ambushes 
were laid to murder him and his party. A 
large spear ''almost grazed my back." 
Another spear missed him by only a foot. 
Two of his men were slain. A huge tree 
had been loosened at the roots, and almost 
fell upon him. Three times in one day he 
escaped . death by a hair's-breadth. So im- 
pressed were his people that they cried, 
*' Peace ! peace ! you will finish your work in 
spite of everything." He took it as an 
omen, and gave thanks to the ''Almighty 
Preserver of men." For five hours he ran 
the gauntlet, " perfectly indifferent whether I 
were killed or not." 

The march was pursued in great suffering 
through August and September, and on into 



VIII DR. LIVINGSTONE 177 

October. Once, he says, he felt like dying 
on his feet. He was profoundly shaken and 
depressed. The infamous traders succeeded, 
but he had failed, he alone, **and experienced 
worry, thwarting, baffling, when almost in 
sight of the end for which I strained.'* 

On the 23rd of October, reduced to a 
skeleton, **a mere ruckle of bones," he 
arrived at Ujiji. Shereef, who had custody 
of his goods, had sold them all off. Shereef, 
says Livingstone, is ** a moral idiot.'* Little 
wonder that he feels like the man in the 
parable who fell among thieves, only, alas! 
there was no Good Samaritan. So he felt ; 
but this time he was mistaken. ** When my 
spirits were at their lowest ebb, the Good 
Samaritan was close at hand." No part of 
his amazing story is better known. On the 
morning of October 28, 1871, Susi came 
running to him **at the top of his speed 
and gasped out, 'an Englishman. I see 
him ! * " 

A caravan was approaching with the 
American flag flying over it. A few minutes 
and the stranger was in front of him, holding 



178 DR. LIVINGSTONE ch. viii 

out his hand, with the words, *' Dr. Living- 
stone, I presume ! " It was Henry Morton 
Stanley, who had undertaken to find him, 
alive or dead. He had engaged to do so 
two years before ; and he had kept his 
word. 



CHAPTER IX 

In the middle of October, 1869, when 

Livingstone was at Bambarre in quest of 

the Lualaba, Mr. Stanley was travelling 

from Madrid to Paris in response to an 

urgent telegram from Mr. James Gordon 

Bennett, Jr., of the New York Herald. 

*' Where do you think Livingstone is 'i " 

was Mr. Bennett^s query when Stanley 

arrived. The latter confessed his ignorance. 

The world in general seemed to be content 

to go on, regardless of Livingstone s fate. 

Nobody knew for certain whether he was 

alive or dead. Mr. Bennett approached the 

question as a journalist. To find Livingstone 

was the most sensational feat that could be 

performed. Mr. Bennett probably underrated 

his own motive of humanity ; but he felt 

that David Livingstone was good *'copy," 

179 



i8o DR. LIVINGSTONE ch. ix 

and that if he were discovered the world 
would ring with the enterprise of the great 
paper with which he was honourably asso- 
ciated. His instructions to Mr. Stanley- 
were of the simplest : " Spare no expense ; 
spend all the money you want ; only find 
Livingstone." By a curious arrangement, 
Stanley was first of all to make a grand tour 
through Constantinople, Palestine, Egypt, 
India. That is why he did not cross 
to Zanzibar till the beginning of 1871. 
Livingstone might have reappeared in the 
interval, but there was no sign. Accord- 
ingly, Stanley organised an imposing ex- 
pedition of nearly 200 persons in five 
caravans, with all kinds of stores, necessary 
and luxurious, and made for the interior 
by way of Unyanyembe. There he himself 
all but perished of fever, arid afterwards 
escaped by a hand s-breadth being made 
the victim of a war between the Arabs 
and the natives. However, he stuck to his 
errand and, as we have seen, arrived in 
Ujiji and greeted Livingstone just when 
the latter was most in need of the kind of 




STANLEY KINDS LIVINGSTONE. 

j8i 



1 82 DR. LIVINGSTONE chak 

cheer and aid that Stanley had brought. 
Five years had passed since Livingstone 
had had news of the outer world ; and 
even now it is a question whether Stanley s 
story to Livingstone or Livingstone's to 
Stanley was the greater tale. Stanley 
brought news of the Franco-German War, 
of General Grant's Presidency, of the elec- 
tric cables laid, and, what touched Living- 
stone deeply, of a vote of ;^i,ooo for supplies 
to him by the Government. So he was 
not entirely forgotten ! Livingstone's story 
was told by degrees — a story of which 
Stanley could be left to estimate the heroism 
and miraculous endurance. Never before 
or since has such a story of one lone man's 
achievement been told to any listener. This 
was the man Stanley had found : this was 
the man he was now to save from despair 
and collapse. '' You have brought me new 
life!" Livingstone kept saying; and it was 
true in every sense. For Stanley had 
brought him news, and food, and medicine, 
and comfort, and, above all, companionship. 
His recovery was remarkable. He began 



IX DR. LIVINGSTONE 183 

to enjoy every luxury provided for him. 
He revelled in the descriptions of the 
history of the memorable five years, as 
Stanley described it in graphic fashion. 
He read and re-read his home letters. He 
luxuriated in clothes, new and clean and 
warm. The imagination loves to dwell on 
this oasis in the desert of his last years* 
He was supremely happy, full of laughter 
and anecdote ; above all, full of gratitude 
to the resourceful and admiring friend who 
had dropped from the clouds to relieve his 
solitude and brace his soul for the final 
exploits. It was Stanley's own testimony 
that this meeting, and the cheerful days 
that followed, seemed to take ten years off 
Livingstone's age, and bring back the air 
of youth to his face and figure. 

They planned together an exploration of 
the northern end of Lake Tanganyika. It 
was a *' picnic," or so Livingstone called it ; 
and it was carried out in that spirit. The 
old explorer had always been convinced that 
Lake Tanganyika contributed its waters to 
the Nile. They found but one river at the 



1 84 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

northern end, and that river flowed in, not 
out. Even so, he was not wholly convinced 
that his theory was unsound. There were 
incidents in the journey that revealed to the 
younger man Livingstone s patience and 
forbearance, and the secret of his unique 
power in gentleness and the forgiving spirit. 
The impression made was never effaced. 

Of the picture of Livingstone, drawn by 
Mr. Stanley's sympathetic and accomplished 
hand, we shall have more to say in the final 
chapter. Meanwhile we only record that 
Stanley succeeded beyond all hopes in the 
first part of his mission, and as conspicuously 
failed in the second. The first part was to 
find Livingstone and minister to his needs. 
There is no manner of doubt that this 
mission was well and truly performed. 
Stanley's repeated acts of generosity brought 
the tears to Livingstone's eyes, and this 
** cold northerner," as he called himself, was 
moved beyond words. From Stanley he 
also received abundance of stores and 
medicines, as well as a company of carriers 
sent back to him eventually from Zanzibar. 



IX DR. LIVINGSTONE 185 

But as to the second part of the mission, 
which was to persuade Livingstone to go 
home at once, where honours and fortune 
awaited him, and his nearest and dearest 
were yearning to see him again — in this 
Stanley had no success. To return, and go 
wearily over many of his old tracks ; to dare 
once again the perils of fever, the enmity of 
the slave trader, and the ignorant antagonism 
of savage peoples — this was the alternative 
programme, and he was resolute to carry it 
out. His problem was not yet fully solved ; 
and, if he could help it, he would not carry 
mere half-baked theories back to England 
after five years of wandering and exile. 
When his daughter Agnes wrote, *' Much as 
I wish you to come home, I had rather that 
you finished your work to your own satisfac- 
tion than return merely to gratify me," he 
writes proudly in his journal : '' Rightly and 
nobly said, my darling Nannie ; vanity 
whispers pretty loudly, ' She is a chip of the 
old block.' My blessing on her, and all 
the rest." 

The plan then formed between the two 



1 86 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

travellers was to return together to Un- 
yanyembe, where Stanley had stores waiting. 
The latter would then push on rapidly to 
Zanzibar, and send back carriers for Living- 
stones new expedition. With these, the 
veteran proposed to return to a final examina- 
tion of the sources of the great rivers, clear 
up the points still in dispute, and then turn 
his face home. They set out together at the 
end of the year 1871, and arrived after seven 
weeks' travelling at Unyanyembe, on Feb. 
1 8th, 1872. The march is prosaically recorded 
by Livingstone. The most frequent entries 
concern Stanley s repeated attacks of fever. 
Occasionally he was so weak that he had to 
be carried. But for the tireless ministration of 
his great companion, and the cheering effect 
of his presence, which was worth many doses 
of quinine, Stanley might easily have suc- 
cumbed. They reached their destination 
only to find that thieves had been active as 
usual, and that both Livingstones and 
Stanley's stores had been extensively 
plundered. There was enough left, how- 
ever, to make Livingstone feel rich : *' I am 



IX DR. LIVINGSTONE 187 

quite set up ; and as soon as he can send 
me men, not slaves, from the coast, I go 
to my work, with a fair prospect of finishing 
It. 

The two friends remained together nearly 
a month at Unyanyembe. Letters and 
parcels arrived. Livingstone rejoices in 
*'four flannel shirts from Agnes," and *'two 
pairs of fine English boots '* from a friend. 
Despatches have to be written, articles for 
the New York Herald, and grateful letters to 
many American and English friends — all of 
which Stanley will take with him. At last, 
on March 14th, the time has come to say 
good-bye. Livingstone*s entry in his diary 
is characteristic: *' Mr. Sfanley leaves. 
I commit to his care my journal, sealed 
with five seals ; the impressions on them are 
those of an American gold coin, anna and half- 
anna, and cake of paint with royal arms. 
Positively not to be opened.'' All that one 
man (naturally reticent and reserved) could 
say of the limitless kindness shown by 
Stanley, and the noble interest taken by 
America, Livingstone expressed in his private 



1 88 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

letters. It is to Stanley's picturesque pen 
that we owe the description of the final part- 
ing, and we may well quote a few sentences 
from it : — '' My days seem to have been 
spent in an Elysian field ; otherwise, why 
should I so keenly regret the near approach 
of the parting hour ? Have I not been 
battered by successive fevers, prostrate with 
agony day after day lately ? Have I not 
raved and stormed in madness? Have I 
not clenched my fists in fury, and fought with 
the wild strength of despair when in delirium ? 
Yet I regret to surrender the pleasure I have 
felt in this man's society, though so dearly 
purchased. . . . March 14th. — We had a 
sad breakfast together. I could not eat, my 
heart was too full ; neither did my companion 
seem to have an appetite. We found some- 
thing to do which kept us longer together. 
At eight o'clock I was not gone, and I had 
thought to have been off at 5 a.m." But the 
final parting must be faced. The Doctor 
will walk out a little way with his friend, and 
start him on his journey. The carriers were 
in lively mood, singing on the march. The 



IX DR. LIVINGSTONE 189 

two friends walked side by side, Stanley 
searching Livingstone's features to impress 
every detail on his memory. At last he halts. 
*' Now, my dear Doctor, the best friends 
must part ; you have come far enough, let 
me beg of you to turn back." "Well," 
Livingstone replied, '* I will say this of you : 
you have done what few men could do — far 
better than some great travellers I know. 
And I am grateful to you for what you have 
done for me. God guide you safe home 
and bless you, my friend." ** And may God 
bring you safe back to us all, my dear friend. 
Farewell ! " '' Farewell ! '' Livingstone turned 
away. Did his heart forebode that this was 
the last white face he would ever see, the 
last white hand he would ever press ? Did 
he feel that he was turning his back for ever 
on home, and rest, and freedom ? Just 
when a dip in the path would hide the return- 
ing exile finally from view, Stanley turned to 
take one more look. " The old man in grey 
clothes " was still there. He, too, turned 
round. *' He was standing near the gate of 
Kwihaha with his servants near him. I 



I90 DR. LIVINGSTONE gh. ix 

waved a handkerchief to him, and he 
responded fey lifting his cap/' 

This was on March 14th. On March 17th, 
at a spot agreed upon, Susi and Hamaydah 
found Stanley and delivered to him a letter 
signed by Livingstone, in which the latter 
gives him a well-seasoned Scotch counsel, 
** to put a stout heart to a stey brae '* ; rejoices 
that Stanley s fever has assumed '* the inter- 
mittent or safe form," and concludes, " I feel 
comfortable in commending you to the 
guardianship of the good Lord and Father of 
all/' 

Two days later it was Livingstone s birth- 
day; and his diary reminds us that though 
this new friend has come and gone, there is 
One Who is with him always even to the end 
of the world. 

March i()th. — My birthday. My Jesus, my 
King, my Life, my all ! I again dedicate my 
whole self to Thee. Accept me. And grant, 

Gracious Father, that ere this year is 
gone I may finish my work. In Jesus' name. 

1 ask it. Amen. 



CHAPTER X 

As we have seen, Livingstone said farewell 
to Stanley on March 14th, 1872; and pre- 
pared to wait in Unyanyembe until his friend 
had reached Zanzibar, and sent a body of 
picked natives back to act as his escort. In 
his diary he makes careful reckonings as to 
the length of time this will mean, and con- 
cludes that he cannot expect his men until 
July 15th. It was August 14th before 
they arrived. He had to wait five weary 
months at Unyanyembe ; and the lateness of 
his start brought the wet weather near, and 
handicapped the expedition from the first. We 
may just stay to record that Stanley s march 
to the coast was beset with difficulties — *' the 
whole ten plagues of Egypt " — but it was 
successfully accomplished, and the men he 
sent back to Livingstone were of the very 

»9* 



192 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

best. Stanley encountered at Zanzibar 
members of an English relief expedition that 
had been sent out to find and succour Living- 
stone. Of this expedition, the explorer's son, 
Oswell, was a member. After hearing 
Stanley's news they decided that it was 
unnecessary to go on, and returned to 
England. 

To the ordinary person five months of 
waiting would have been almost intolerable. 
There are signs that even Livingstone had 
some ado to sit still and count the days. 
But if they were profitless months to him, 
and if often he was, as he records, *' weary, 
weary," the revelations contained in his 
journal are by no means profitless to us. He 
has time to write fully as to his plans and his 
motives. He takes us into his confidence ; 
and we see that he has lost nothing in all 
these years of that eager curiosity which 
belonged to him as a boy. He still carries in 
his breast '* the heart of a little child/' The 
wonderful Ptolemy and the naive Herodotus 
are pondered over ; and all the stories of 
*' fountains" and ''pillars" awaken in the 



X DR. LIVINGSTONE 193 

great traveller the desire to test them for 
himself. He is evidently not sure that there 
is not something in them after all. He would 
dearly like to find out. He cannot reconcile 
Ptolemy with the investigation of Baker, 
Speke, and Grant ; and it has all the delight of 
a fascinating conundrum to him. 

April \%th, — '* I pray the good Lord of 
all to favour me so as to allow me to discover 
the ancient fountains of Herodotus, and if 
there is anything in the underground ex- 
cavations to confirm the precious old docu- 
ments (ra /3^yS\/a), the Scriptures of truth, 
may He permit me to bring it to light, 
and give me wisdom to make a proper use 
of it." 

On the first of May he records that he 
has finished a letter to the New York 
Herald. This is the letter which concludes 
with the now world-renowned words upon 
his tablet in the Abbey — ''AH I can add 
in my loneliness is, may Heavens rich 
blessing come down on every one — Ameri- 
can, English, or Turk — who will help to 
heal the open sore of the world." By a 



194 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

coincidence the words were written one year 
to the very day before the writer s death. 

He meditates much on the native faiths. 
He recognises as the fundamental fact 
'* dependence on a Divine Power," but 
'* without any conscious feeling of its 
nature.'' He notes also their belief in a 
continued existence after death, so as to be 
able to do good to those they love and 
evil to those they hate. 

*' I don't know how the great loving 
Father will bring all out right at last, but 
He knows and will do it." For himself, 
his confidence is anchored, as it has always 
been, in the plain word of Christ, the 
perfect Gentleman. 

May i2)tk — '' He will keep His word, the 
Gracious One, full of grace and truth — no 
doubt of it. He said, * Him that cometh 
unto Me, I will in no wise cast out,' and 
' Whatsoever ye shall ask in My name that 
will I do.' He will keep His word : then 
I can come and humbly present my petition 
and it will be all right. Doubt is here in- 
admissible, surely." 



X DR. LIVINGSTONE 195 

He is reading Speke s travels with critical 
enjoyment. He spends a page or two 
in challenging his statement that African 
mothers sell their own children. He does 
not believe it. He has never known an 
instance, nor have the Arabs. He always 
defends the essential goodness of the natives, 
and their common human feelings. Then 
he appeals to the heroism of the Church 
at home to come and help the African 
people. *' I would say to missionaries, 
Come on, brethren, to the real heathen. 
You have no idea how brave you are till 
you try. Leaving the coast tribes and 
devoting yourselves heartily to the savages, 
as they are called, you will find, with some 
drawbacks and wickednesses, a very great 
deal to admire and love." A little later 
he is arguing that the interior is a tempting 
field for *' well-sustained efforts of private 
benevolence." He thinks the missionary 
should make up his mind not to depend 
upon ** foreign support," and gives instances 
of his own resourcefulness where he had 
none to depend on but himself. He is 



196 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

for *' a sort of Robinson Crusoe life," the 
great object being '' to improve the im- 
provable among the natives." As to method, 
he writes later, *'no jugglery or sleight-of- 
hand . . . would have any effect in the 
civilisation of Africans ; they have too much 
good sense for that. Nothing brings them 
to place thorough confidence in Europeans 
but a long course of well-doing. . . . Good- 
ness and unselfishness impress their minds 
more than any kind of skill or power. 
They say, *You have different hearts from 
ours.' . . . The prayer to Jesus for a new 
heart and a right spirit at once commends 
itself as appropriate." He notes, too, that 
music influences them, and often leads to 
conversion. 

Scattered through the journal are his 
usual keen observations on the animal life 
and plant life of the district, together with 
brief narratives of tribal quarrels and crimes. 
Again and again he confesses uncertainty as 
to whether he has not been tracing the 
sources of the Congo rather than the Nile. 
If he had not had a scientific mind and train- 



X DR. LIVINGSTONE 197 

ing, he argues that long ere this he would 
have cried '' Eureka!'' and gone home with a 
half-proved hypothesis. But his absolute 
love of truth forbids. 

By the middle of July his men have not 
come, though he has heard of them as being 
on the way. He is very tired of the delay ; 
but returns at length to the subject of missions 
in Africa, and indulges in one passage which 
clearly shows how his Puritan common-sense 
never deserted him. '*A couple of Euro- 
peans beginning and carrying on a mission 
without a staff of foreign attendants implies 
coarse country fare, it is true, but this would 
be nothing to those who at home amuse 
themselves with fasts, vigils, &c." A great 
deal of power is thus lost in the Church. 
Fastings and vigils, without a special object 
in view, are time run to waste. They are 
made to minister to a sort of self-gratification, 
instead of being turned to account for the 
good of others. They are like groaning in 
sickness. Some people amuse themselves 
when ill with continuous moaning. The 
forty days of Lent might be annually spent 



198 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

in visiting adjacent tribes and bearing 
unavoidable hunger and thirst with a good 
grace. Considering the greatness of the 
object to be attained, men might go without 
sugar, coffee, tea, &c. I went from Sep- 
tember, 1866, to December, 1868, without 
either.'' 

He gives us also a vivid summary of his 
impressions of the slave system, assuring us 
that '' in sober seriousness, the subject does 
not admit of exaggeration. To overdraw its 
evils is a simple impossibility. The sights I 
have seen, though common incidents of the 
traffic, are so nauseous that I always try to 
drive them from memory. In the case of 
most disagreeable recollections I can succeed, 
in time, in consigning them to oblivion, but 
the slaving scenes come back unbidden, and 
make me start up at dead of night horrified 
by their vividness." 

August comes, and still no arrivals. 
There is a charming description of the 
African children and their sports and games, 
followed by observations on the swallows 
and the spiders. Then he breaks off to 



X DR. LIVINGSTONE 199 

exclaim : " That is the atonement of Christ. 
It IS Himself. It is the inherent and ever- 
lasting mercy of God made apparent to 
human eyes and ears. The everlasting love 
was disclosed by our Lord's life and death. 
It showed that God forgives because He 
loves to forgive. He works by smiles, if 
possible ; if not, by frowns. Pain is only a 
means of enforcing love." 

At last, on August 14th, the miserable 
suspense is at an end. The new expedition 
marches safely into Unyanyembe. Living- 
stone lifts up his heart in gratitude to God. 
Many of those who have come to help him 
had marched with Stanley and were well 
seasoned. Some were Nassick boys from 
Bombay, among whom were John and Jacob 
Wainwright. It will never be forgotten 
how much we owe to the intelligence and 
courage of the latter. Five only in the 
new expedition belonged to Livingstone's 
** original followers." These are Susi, 
Chumah, Amoda, Mabruki and Gardner. 
It is much to know that Livingstone was 
never more loyally and devotedly served 



200 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

than during this last march, which was to 
have so sad a termination and so heroic a 
sequel. 

Ten days were allowed for rest and 
preparations for departure, which included 
the setting aside of certain stores to await 
them on the homeward march. Then, on 
August 25th, they slipped quietly out of the 
town of which Livingstone was so weary, 
and started for the southern part of 
Tanganyika. We are beginning now the 
last journey, which ended eight and a half 
months later, after incredible toils and 
sufferings. It is difficult to estimate the 
exact length of it, for there were many short 
diversions. One need only remember that 
from the middle of September David 
Livingstone was to all intents and purposes 
a dying man. The internal haemorrhage 
began again, and the entry in his diary on 
September 19th is that for eight days he 
has eaten nothing. No rest and no 
medicines have any lasting effect upon him 
after this ; and he can scarcely have been 
out of pain, which frequently amounted to 



X DR. LIVINGSTONE 201 

agony. They made their way at first mainly 
through forest and hilly country, passing 
from village to village, each day having its 
burden of travel, its problem of supplies. 
Livingstone finds the climbing **very sore 
on legs and lungs." On the 8th of October 
his eyes rested once again on the blue 
waters of Tanganyika. The day heat is 
very trying. Some of the men are sick ; 
all are tired. '* Inwardly I feel tired 
too." 

They had come to Tanganyika by a 
circuitous route. They now kept to the 
highlands running south-west, and travelled 
along the ridge, 1,000 feet above the lake. 
He notes that the lake-side is favourable for 
cotton, and admires the glory of the sunsets. 
The various arms and bays of the lake are 
carefully observed. The route is still very 
mountainous, and painfully up and down. 
October is past before he reaches the part 
where the lake narrows and becomes what 
the natives call Lake Liemba. It is slow and 
weary work around the southern section. 
The heat is intense. **The sun makes the 



202 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

soil so hot that the radiation is as if it came 
from a furnace. It burns the feet of the 
people and knocks them up. Subcutaneous 
inflammation is frequent in the legs, and 
makes some of my most hardy men useless.'* 
He maintains that walking is better than 
riding. Suddenly he breaks off his descrip- 
tion of the toilsomeness of the journey to set 
this down : 

'* The spirit of Missions is the spirit of our 
Master, the very genesis of His religion. A 
diffusive philanthropy is Christianity itself. 
It requires perpetual propagation to attest 
its genuineness." 

The day after this he is ** ill and losing 
much blood.'' Another disaster is that the 
large donkey which has borne him from time 
to time over difficult ground has been badly 
bitten by tsetse, is now useless, and shortly 
dies. *' It is a great loss to me." 

From the southern extremity of the lake 
they proceeded almost due south, the main 
difficulty being provided by the Lofu river, 
over which they built a bridge. A little 
further south they turned westward, evidently 



X DR. LIVINGSTONE 203 

making for the north of Lake Bangweolo. 
Many rivers are crossed, and more hilly- 
regions negotiated. Then comes an entry 
in the journal in so shaky a hand as to be 
almost undecipherable. It simply tells us 
that he is ill and camping '* in a deserted 
village.'' Yet there is no halting on the 
march. River after river is crossed ; and on 
December i8th he sees once more his old 
friend the Kalongosi or Kalongwes6 river. 
*' We crossed it in small canoes, and 
swamped one twice, but no one was lost." 
They now march south for the lake. 
Christmas Day — *' our great day'' — is cold 
and wet, but it inspires Livingstone's thanks 
to '*the good Lord for the good gift of His 
Son, Christ Jesus our Lord." He also finds 
time for some meditations on the Blue and 
the White Nile. The end of the year 
brings very heavy weather, during which no 
observations can be taken. One of the men 
also is taken critically ill and dies. They 
plant four trees at the corners of the grave. 

As the expedition drew near Lake 
Bangweolo, they came upon a region com- 



204 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

posed of ** spongy " morass. The men des- 
cribe It as endless plunging in and out of 
morasses, and the effect on their strength 
and spirits must be conceived. It was 
terrible work, and Livingstone was spent 
with chronic dysentery. On they went, 
however, plunging through this horrible 
country. Yet such alleviations as nature 
affords are not forgotten. Livingstone 
enumerates all the flowers he sees : the 
marigolds and the jonquils, the orchids and 
the clematis, the gladioli and the flowering 
bulbs. He rejoices also to distinguish 
balsams and *' pretty flowery aloes, yellow 
and red, in one whorl of blossoms." The 
world is clearly not forsaken that has these 
tokens of the divine presence. 

A week of priceless time was lost in the 
middle of January owing to the misre- 
presentations of a chief called Chungu ; and 
all the while they were marching aimlessly 
over the desperate spongy country. They 
have to get back to their starting point, and 
strike eastward to make a circuit of the lake. 
Livingstone has to be carried across many 



X DR. LIVINGSTONE 205 

of the morasses and rivers on the shoulders 
of one or other of his men. The march was 
at times almost impossible. January 23rd saw 
them quite lost. No observations could be 
taken, and it was **rain, rain, rain." Then 
came January 24th, and this dramatic entry 
in the journal : 

"Carrying me across one of the broad, 
deep, sedgy rivers is really a very difficult 
task One we crossed was at least 2,000 feet 
broad. The first part, the main stream, came 
up to Susi s mouth, and wetted my seat and 
legs. One held up my pistol behind, then one 
after another took a turn, and when he sank 
into an elephant's deep footprints he required 
two to lift him. . . Every ten or twelve paces 
brought us to a clear stream, flowing fast in 
its own channel, while over all a strong 
current came bodily through all the rushes 
and aquatic plants. Susi had the first spell ; 
then Farijala ; then a tall, stout, Arab-looking 
man; then Amoda; then Chanda; then Wade 
Sal6 ; and each time I was lifted off bodily and 
put on another pair of stout, willing shoulders, 
and fifty yards put them out of breath — no 



2o6 DR. LIVINGSTONE 



CHAP. 



wonder!" We are not surprised to learn 
that progress is ^' distressingly slow ; wet, 
wet, wet, sloppy weather truly, and no 
observations." January closes miserably. 
They have no proper guides. ''It is drop, 
drop, drop, and drizzling from the north- 
west." The country is all froths and sponges. 
Livingstone loses much blood, but with 
characteristic optimism expresses the hope 
that it is a safety-valve, for he has no fever. 

The lack of guides is serious. Livingstone 
reckons they lost half a month now flounder- 
ing about in this sodden, depressing country, 
suffering much hunger ; and it is all due to 
the unfriendliness of some and the fears of 
others. When guides were ultimately 
obtained progress was far more speedy and 
direct ; but what the fatigue and exposure 
have meant to the sick man can be best 
gauged by the note in the journal on 
February 14th, which follows the record of 
another ''excessive haemorrhagic discharge." 

"If the good Lord gives me favour, and 
permits me to finish my work I shall thank 
and bless Him, though it costs me untold toil, 



X DR. LIVINGSTONE 207 

pain and travel ; this trip has made my hair 
all grey." 

Melancholy reading as the last month has 
been, it is perhaps not so heartbreaking as 
the next. It represents the almost desperate 
exertions of a dying man to get on ; yet he is 
thwarted and deceived at every turn. He 
fixes his hopes on the chief Matipa, and on 
the 22nd of February sends Susi and Chumah 
to find him. Matipa appeared to be friendly, 
and eventually the expedition travels by 
canoes towards his country. Then they have 
to cross flooded prairie, and camp on a 
** miserable, dirty, fishy island." They arrive 
at last, and Matipa is profuse in his promises 
and plausible in his plans. Time was of no 
value to Matipa. He drowned his cares in 
** pombe " ; but Livingstone is in misery. 
Day after day passes, a[nd no promised 
canoes arrive to carry the expedition west- 
ward. By the i8th of March he is convinced 
that Matipa is '' acting the villain." The 
next day is his birthday, and sacred to 
other thoughts. "Thanks to the Almighty 
Preserver of man for sparing me thus far on 



2o8 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

the journey of life. Can I hope for ultimate 
success ? So many obstacles have arisen. 
Let not Satan prevail over me, O my good 
Lord Jesus ! '* 

Never had he been in worse case. Matipa 
was false again ; and Livingstone took the 
extreme step, for him, of making a demonstra- 
tion in force, and firing a pistol through the 
roof of the chiefs house — a movement which 
resulted in Matipa s flight. He returned, how- 
ever, soon after in a chastened frame of mind. 
Some canoes being available at last, on 
March 24th Livingstone started with all his 
goods, his object being to get across the 
Chambeze. It was an awful journey. Six 
hours' punting brought them to a little islet 
without a tree, and the rain descended 
pitilessly. They got what shelter they 
could out of an inverted canoe, and crouched 
under it. The wind tore the tent and 
damaged it. The loads were soaked. It 
was bitterly cold. ** A man put my bed into 
the bilge and never said * Bail out,* so I am 
safe for a wet night, but it turned out better 
than I expected." 



X DR. LIVINGSTONE 209 

** March 2%tk. — Nothing earthly will make 
me give up my work in despair. I encourage 
myself in the Lord my God and go forward." 

The next day sees them across the 
Chambeze ; but progress is extremely slow, 
and it is April the 5th before the neighbour- 
ing river, Lobingela, is passed. Meanwhile, 
as we learn from a subsequent entry in the 
diary, his final critical illness has begun. On 
March 31st, an artery began '* bleeding 
profusely." Yet he does not dream of 
resting. The whole country round Lake 
Bangweolo is a shallow sea. It is impossible 
to say where the rivers begin and end. 
Livingstone's mode of progression is being 
punted along in a canoe. Further inland 
there is a marching party struggling along 
parallel with the canoes. On April loth, he 
sets down that he is pale and bloodless. The 
artery 'Ogives off a copious stream and takes 
away my strength. Oh ! how I long to be 
permitted by the Over Power to finish my 
work." The 17th of April witnesses another 
calamity, when '' a tremendous rain after dark 
burst all our now rotten tents in shreds." 



2IO DR. LIVINGSTONE ch. x 

He is now utterly weak and ill, fighting his 
complaint with quinine, and trying to believe 
it is no more than fever. On the 19th, 
however, he confesses he is ** excessively 
weak, and but for the donkey could not 
move a hundred yards." He adds pawkily, 
** it is not all pleasure this exploration." 

The diary is now painful reading, the 
writing becomes very shaky, eloquent of 
weakness and pain. 

He has service on Sunday, April 20th, as 
usual. 

The last entries are quite short. 

^' 2ist April. — Tried to ride but was 
forced to lie down, and they carried me back 
to vil., exhausted." The fact is that the old 
hero insisted on being put on his donkey, 
only to fall to the ground. He was carried 
back to the halting-place on Chumah's 
shoulders. 

''22nd April. — Carried on kitanda over 
Buga, S.W. 2\'' The men made a rude 
palanquin, covered it with grass and a 
blanket, and in this way carried the dying 
chief for two hours and a quarter. They 




ON THE LAST MARCH. 



212 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

were two and a quarter hours of excruciating 
agony ; and it was a relief to all when a 
village was reached where a rude hut could 
be erected. 

The next day was similar. They carried 
him for another hour and a half. The 
following day one hour's journey was all 
that he, in his extreme emaciation, could 
endure. He was too weak now to write 
anything except the date. On the 25th, 
they proceeded for an hour, and found them- 
selves among a simple, friendly people. The 
trend of Livingstone's thoughts may be 
gathered by some questions he addressed to 
the natives. He wanted to know whether 
they had ever heard of a hill on which four 
rivers had their rise. They shook their 
heads, but confessed themselves no travellers. 
On the following day they still moved on ; 
and Livingstone's unconquerable hope 
appeared in the fact that he instructed Susi 
to buy two large tusks, because he might 
be short of goods when they got back to 
Ujiji, and he could buy cloth of the Arabs 
with them. 



X DR. LIVINGSTONE 213 

The last entry in the diary, the last words 
he ever wrote, stand under the date April 
27th, 1873:— 

'' 27. — Knocked up quite and remain — 
recover — sent to buy milch goats. — We are 
on the banks of the Molilamo.'' 

He is lying at Kolunganjovu's town. His 
one hope is in milk, but the search for milch 
goats was vain. The whole district had 
been plundered by the Mazitu. He tried to 
eat a little pounded corn but failed. The 
28th was spent in similar vain endeavours 
to obtain milk. On the 29th the chief, who 
said ''everything should be done for his 
friend," offered to escort the caravan to the 
crossing-place, and see them provided with 
canoes. There was an initial difficulty. 
Livingstone could not walk to the door of 
the hut to reach his litter. The wall was 
opened, and the sick man transferred from 
his bed to the litter in that way. The 
narrative of his devoted men is now most 
explicit. It is eloquent alike of the great 
leader's fortitude and their own unfailing 
consideration. We need not linger on the 



214 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

details ; the agony of lifting him into the 
canoe, and lifting him out ; the journey 
through ** swamps and plashes"; the 
arrival at Chitambo's village ; the delays in 
building the hut while he lay ** under the 
broad eaves of a native hut," and a soft 
drizzle of rain descended. At last the shelter 
was erected and banked round with earth ; 
the bed was made, raised on sticks and 
grass ; the medicine chest placed on a large 
box that did duty for a table ; and a fire 
kindled outside opposite the door. Just 
inside the boy Majwara lay down and slept, 
that he might be at hand if wanted. 

The imagination reverently dwells on 
every detail of the scene, for the old hero 
has made his last journey, and is about to 
sleep his last sleep. While he was lying 
on his litter outside, and the rain was falling, 
curious villagers had gathered round, each 
man with bow in hand, for they had been 
guarding their crops. This was the great 
chief who had come from far. His fame 
they knew somewhat ; they could not know 
that he was the best friend Africa ever 



X DR. LIVINGSTONE 215 

had. They gazed respectfully and wonder- 
ingly at the thin, pale, emaciated sufferer 
with the bloodless hands and lips, and the 
face distorted with sharp throes of agony. 
Through the falling rain they watched him ; 
and in days to come would tell their children 
that they had seen Livingstone. 

That night passed quietly ; and when 
Chitambo called next day, Livingstone, 
with unfailing courtesy, received him, though 
he had to beg the chief to go away and 
return on the following day, when he hoped 
to feel stronger. All that morning he lay 
suffering, his strength gradually ebbing. 
In the afternoon he bade Susi bring him 
his watch, and with great effort he slowly 
wound it. Night fell at last ; and at 
eleven o'clock Livingstone called Susi. 
There were noises heard. *'Are our men 
making those noises?" said Livingstone. 
Susi told him that the villagers were scaring 
a buffalo. "Is this the Luapula ? '' he 
asked again ; and Susi knew that his 
master was wandering in his mind. How 
ardently he had desired to reach the 



2i6 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

Luapula through those terrible weeks and 
months on the sponges and through the 
floods ! When Susi told him where they 
were, he asked again, '* How many days 
to the Luapula?'' *' I think it is three 
days," said Susi. There was no more 
except the cry of pain, '* Oh, dear, dear ! " 
Then he dozed. Near midnight he sent 
for Susi again. This time Livingstone 
told him to boil some water ; and, when 
Susi had filled the copper kettle, he again 
asked for the medicine chest. The candle 
had to be held close to him, for his eyes 
were very dim. But he did just succeed 
in selecting some calomel, which he wanted 
to have at his side with a little water in 
a cup. 

Then he said, very faintly, ** All right ! 
you can go now." 

These were the last words he was heard 
to speak. It almost seemed as if a higher 
Master had said to His tired servant, 
** All right ! You can go now." 

What happened after that is known only 
to the One who was with him at the last 



X DR. LIVINGSTONE 217 

The boy Majwara slept ; and while he 
slept the miracle happened. For it appeared 
miraculous and incredible to his men, who 
had seen his utter inability to move himself, 
that he did actually rise from off that rude 
couch and did kneel down at the side, his 
knees probably on the bare soil, and there 
in the attitude of prayer commended him- 
self to God, 

*'And his fair soul unto his Captain 
Christ." 

When the lad Majwara awoke at 4 a.m. 
and saw the strange sight of his master 
kneeling thus, he was afraid, and slipped 
out to warn the others. Susi dared not 
go in alone. He ran to rouse Chumah, 
Chowpere, Matthew, and Nuanyas^r6. The 
six stood awestruck at the door of the 
little hut. On the box a candle was burn- 
ing. It was just stuck there in its own 
wax, but it relieved the darkness ; and 
they gazed at the still, bowed form. He 
was lying, stretched forward across the bed, 
in the attitude of prayer, his head buried 
in his hands. None seemed to dare to 



2i8 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

approach him for a while. Then Matthew, 
reverently and tremblingly, stretched out 
his hand and laid it on his master s cheek. 
It was quite cold. David Livingstone was 
dead. It was the morning of the first of 
May, 1873. 

With the death of the hero, most 
biographies perforce end. In this respect 
Livingstone s story is wholly unique. The 
most thrilling and sensational chapter remains 
to be written. Nothing more convincingly 
illustrates Livingstone's ascendancy over his 
followers than the events which followed his 
death. It would have been easy foi^ the men 
to have hurried the body into the ground, 
divided the property among themselves, and 
dispersed to their homes. Perhaps the last 
thing to be expected was that they would 
shoulder the dead body, and carry it from the 
centre of Africa, more than a thousand miles, 
through hostile and inhospitable country, to 
the ocean. Yet this was what they did ; 
while the method, order and reverence of 
their proceedings would have done honour 
to the wisest and most civilised of our race. 



X DR. LIVINGSTONE 219 

Let us now see how they faced the duty that 
had suddenly come to them. 

The discovery that Livingstone was dead 
was made about 4 a.m. The news was 
carried round at once to all the men ; and as 
soon as day dawned they assembled for 
conference. The dead man's possessions 
were collected, the boxes opened in the 
presence of all, and Jacob Wainwright made 
a careful and exact inventory on a page of 
Livingstone's little metallic pocket-book, in 
which his own last entries had been made. 
The next business was to appoint Susi and 
Chumah, the oldest and most experienced of 
Livingstones followers, as leaders of the 
expedition. All promised to obey their orders ; 
and all kept their word. Fearing lest the 
native superstitions in regard to departed 
spirits might lead to some outrage on the 
dead body, or that Chitambo might demand 
some ruinous fine, they decided to conceal 
for the present the fact of the death. 
In this respect they had misjudged Chitambo, 
who soon learned what had happened, and 
proved himself the kindest and most 



220 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

sympathetic of advisers. All were agreed 
that the body of Livingstone must be carried 
back to the coast. 

The first practical step, after making the in- 
ventory, was a remarkable one. Outside 
Chitambo's village the men erected a small set- 
tlement of their own, fortified by a stockade. 
Here they built a circular hut, open to the sky, 
but strong enough to resist any attack of wild 
beasts, and in this they laid the body of 
Livingstone. His followers were stationed 
all round like a guard of honour. It happened 
that Farijala had once been servant to a 
Zanzibar doctor, and knew the elementary 
facts about a post-mortem. With the assist- 
ance of a Nassick boy, Carras, he undertook 
to do what was necessary. Certain rites of 
mourning having been performed, and 
volleys fired, a screen was held over these 
men while they did their work. The heart 
and viscera were removed, placed in a tin 
box, and reverently buried four feet in the 
ground, while Jacob Wainwright read the 
Burial Service from the English Prayer Book. 
The body was then dried in sun for fourteen 



X DR. LIVINGSTONE 221 

days. So emaciated was it that there was 
little more than skin and bone. For coffin, 
they stripped the bark off a Myonga tree *' in 
one piece " ; the corpse was carefully 
enveloped in calico and inserted in the bark 
cylinder. The whole was sewn up in a piece 
of sail-cloth and lashed to a pole, so that it 
could be carried on the men s shoulders. Then 
Jacob Wainwright carved Livingstone s name 
and the date of his death on the tree standing 
near where the body rested. Chitambo was 
charged to keep the ground free from grass 
lest bush-fires should burn the tree. Finally 
they erected two strong posts, with a cross 
beam, and covered them thoroughly with tar, 
so that the spot might be definitely identified. 
They seem to have forgotten nothing that 
could be done to keep in perpetual memory 
the place where Livingstone breathed his last. 
The line of march determined on was up 
the west coast of Lake Bangweolo and across 
the Luapula River ; then north-eastward till 
they struck the route by which they had 
come from Unyanyembe. It seemed at 
the outset as if all their hopes were to be 



222 DR. LIVINGSTONE ch. x 

frustrated. In three days half the ex- 
pedition were down with fever. Two 
women died. Susi became critically ill 
and could not move. They were delayed 
a whole month, and only started again to 
break down once more. It was not till 
they had crossed the great Luapula River 
— four miles broad — that things went better 
with them. Near where the River Lipo- 
shosi flows into the lake at Chawendes 
village, the expedition was unfortunately 
brought into active conflict with the chief 
and his tribe, and a regular affray took place 
in which blood was shed and many native 
houses burned. It is probable that a calmer 
and stronger leadership might have averted 
this ; but it was proof of the determination 
of the devoted band to defend their precious 
burden with their lives. After this, the 
march was, on the whole, a favourable 
and peaceful one. They turned north to- 
wards Tanganyika, but, profiting by previ- 
ous experience, gave the lake itself a wide 
berth, keeping well to the east, and travel- 
ling far more easily than Livingstone had 




CARRYING THE BODY TO THE SEA. 



223 



224 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

done owing to the fact that they largely 
avoided the mountainous region. Every- 
where the news of Livingstone's death had 
preceded them ; and they were made aware 
that a party of Englishmen was at Un- 
yanyembe awaiting their arrival. Jacob 
Wainwright wrote down the story as we 
know it, and Chumah hurried on by forced 
marches to deliver it to the Englishmen in 
question, who turned out to be Lieutenant 
Cameron, Dr. Dillon, and Lieutenant Mur- 
phy, members of a search expedition. To 
them, on October 20th, 1873, Chumah 
brought the news, and soon afterwards 
the gallant band arrived and delivered all 
Livingstones belongings intact to his 
fellow-countrymen. Lieutenant Cameron 
was decidedly in favour of burying the 
body in African soil ; he also took the 
liberty of appropriating most of Living- 
stone's instruments to the use of his ex- 
pedition. This latter act the men were 
powerless to resist, but in regard to the 
former they were not to be moved. It was 
useless to argue with them as to the dis- 



X DR. LIVINGSTONE 225 

turbed district between Unyanyembe and 
the coast. They had made up their minds 
that the great Doctor must '* go home." 
Lieutenant Murphy and Dr. Dillon decided 
to return to Zanzibar with them, and the 
former does not appear to have been a very 
amicable companion. Dr. Dillon's tragic 
fate is well known. Seized with fever on 
the journey, he went out of his mind and 
committed suicide. 

One further incident has to be recorded 
illustrative of the resolution and ingenuity of 
the members of the expedition. Near 
Kasekera matters developed threateningly, 
and the men became convinced that there 
would be growing hostility along the route to 
the passage of a dead body. They accord- 
ingly resorted to a ruse. They unpacked 
the body, and repacked it to look like an 
ordinary bale of goods. Then they filled the 
old cylinder with sticks and grasses, and 
solemnly despatched six men back to 
Unyanyembe to bury it ! Needless to say 
that as soon as these men got well into the 
jungle they disposed of their burden, and 



226 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

rejoined the main caravan by devious routes. 
So well did every man keep his counsel, that 
it was believed henceforth that ordinary 
merchandise was being carried to Zanzibar. 
On February 15th, 1874, their sacred charge 
was fulfilled, and their precious burden, so 
jealously and triumphantly preserved, was 
handed over to the possession of the British 
Consul at Bagamoio on the coast. The 
Calcutta transferred the remains to Aden, 
and the P. and O. steamer Malwa carried them 
thence to Southampton, where on April 15th 
a special train was in waiting to convey them 
to London. That evening they were deposited 
in the rooms of the Geographical Society in 
Savile Row, and examined by Sir William 
Fergusson and other medical gentlemen. 
The *' oblique fracture" of the arm which 
had been broken by the lion so many years 
before, and the false joint that had resulted, 
provided ample identification of the remains. 
On Saturday, April i8th, they were borne 
through the crowded streets of the capital to 
Westminster Abbey and deposited in the 
centre of the nave. Among the pall-bearers 



X DR. LIVINGSTONE 227 

were several who had been closely identified 
with the great explorer — Mr. Stanley, Dr. 
Kirk, Mr. Webb, Mr. Oswell, Mr. Young^ 
and not least Jacob Wainwright, the Nassick 
boy. In the vast congregation there was no 
nobler, or more striking figure than Living- 
stone s father-in-law, the veteran Dr. Moffat, 
the father of her who " sleeps on Shupanga 
brae, and beeks forenent the sun." No grave 
in the famous Abbey is more frequently asked 
for by visitors than his. It makes its solemn 
appeal to the world year after year, for the 
plain slab is extraordinarily happy in its 
inscription : — 

Brought by faithful hands 
Over land and sea. 

Here Rests 

David Livingstone, 

Missionary, Traveller, Philanthropist. 

Born March 19, 18 13, 

At Blantyre, Lanarkshire. 

Died May 4th,^ 1873, 

At Chitambo's Village, Ilala. 

^ There appears to be a conflict of evidence as to the date oi 
Livingstone's death. Whilst the Diary gives the date as the 1st of 
May, that on the grave in Westminster Abbey is the 4th. 



228 DR. LIVINGSTONE ch. x 

For thirty years his life was spent 
in an unwearied effort to evangelise 
the native races, to explore the 

undiscovered secrets, 
And abolish the desolating slave- 
trade of Central Africa, where, with 

his last words, he wrote : 
''All I can say in my solitude is, 
may Heaven's rich blessing come 
down on every one — American, 
English, Turk — who will help to 
heal the open sore of the world." 

Along the right border of the stone ran 
the happily-chosen words : — 

Tantus amor veri, nihil est quod 

noscere malim 

Quam fluvii causas, 

per saecula tanta latentes. 

And along the left border, 

^* Other sheep I have which are 

not of this fold, them also I must 

bring, and they shall hear my 

voice." 



CHAPTER XI 

CHARACTERISTICS 

The life of Livingstone has been indiffer- 
ently told if the personality of the man has 
not appeared in these pages. But the reader 
will welcome a few personal details that 
could not well find a place in previous 
chapters. The portrait of Livingstone is 
well known. It is a strong, rugged face, 
rather heavy and severe in its general effect, 
with a thick dark moustache, a broad mouth 
and full chin — the whole lightened, however, 
by the honest kindly eyes and the suggestion 
of humour about the lips. When he was a 
young man it would appear that his hair was 
almost black, but it became lighter in colour 
later, and the lock of it in possession of one 
of his relatives is distinctly brown. He is 
himself our authority for saying that his 

329 



230 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

beard was reddish in colour ; and it must 
be remembered that in this respect all our 
pictures are at fault. Not one of them 
shows us a bearded African traveller ; yet, 
except on his visits to England, he always 
wore a beard. Stanley's first impression was 
of the grey-bearded man whom he found at 
Ujiji. Later on he noted that his hair had 
still a '* brownish colour," but that his beard 
and moustache were ''very grey." Stanley 
also paid a tribute to the brightness of his 
eyes, which he says were hazel. They 
appear to have been grey with a bluish 
tinge. Livingstone himself comments on the 
astonishment of the natives at his red beard 
and blue eyes. From that reference one 
might imagine that he had the appearance 
of a Viking or Scandinavian ; but the fact is 
that his eyes were really more grey than 
blue, and that his hair was a very dark 
brown, while his beard was more distinctively 
Scotch and ''sandy." 

In height he always appeared quite short 
when in contact with tall companions. But 
he was about average height, say five feet 



XI DR. LIVINGSTONE 231 

SIX inches ; certainly not more. He had the 
broad chest and shoulders of a man specially 
built to endure exceptional fatigue ; but 
otherwise he always created the impression 
of a short and spare man. That he inherited 
an iron constitution is evident from the mere 
narrative of his travels and privations. One 
of the things that most vividly impressed 
Stanley was how swiftly the man he found 
so worn and thin and haggard threw off the 
burden of the years, recovered his old 
buoyancy of spirit and physical efficiency, 
and took upon him the appearance of one 
who was ten years younger than his actual 
age. 

He was in some ways a fastidious person. 
He was scrupulously neat in his manner of 
dress. Even on his travels, when making 
his way through swamp and jungle, the one 
luxury he most prized was a change of 
raiment ; and his torn clothes would be 
mended to the best of his ability. Stanley 
found him ** dressed in a red shirt, with a 
crimson joho, with a gold band round his 
cap, an old tweed pair of pants, and shoes 



232 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

looking the worse for wear.* The wonder is 
he had anything left that was fit to be seen, 
and the new apparel that came to him was 
hailed with genuine exclamations of delight. 
He set great store on an example to the 
natives of simplicity and neatness. This 
characteristic also comes out in other ways. 
His diaries are done with wonderful care 
and precision. His handwriting was not 
naturally good, but it is admirably legible. 
Every entry in his diary bears upon it the 
marks of method and neatness, while the 
scientific observations are set forth with a 
clearness which won the highest praise from 
those best competent to give it. Nothing 
was slurred over. There is no sign of hurry 
or of the exhaustion of patience. Similarly, 
there is a notable absence of all embroidery. 
The language is throughout austerely plain 
and truthful. Everything is in keeping with 
his essential character of a man who hated 
the vulgarity of useless or tawdry rhetoric, 
and held always by the refinement of sim- 
plicity. From many anecdotes related of 
him it is clear that not only his writing but 



XI DR. LIVINGSTONE 233 

his private and public speech were affected 
by his taste in this respect. A letter is 
extant in which he counselled his children to 
speak English because it was '* prettier" than 
Scotch. He was doubtless thinking of the 
somewhat coarse Scotch accent prevalent in 
Glasgow and the neighbourhood, where his 
youth was spent. Strangers who met him 
were uniformly impressed by the softness 
and gentleness of his speech. His voice 
was deep ; and if sometimes in public it took 
on a harsh sound, this was undoubtedly due 
to the difficulty of public utterance, which he 
never mastered. His addresses to great 
audiences in England were always delivered 
in a slow, hesitating, and rather laboured 
fashion. For one thing, he grew so accus- 
tomed to thinking and speaking- in the native 
languages of Africa that his own tongue 
became strange to him. But, apart from that, 
he was never a fluent speaker ; public address 
was an ordeal to him, and he had a Puritan 
disposition towards restraint and reserve, 
combined with a scientific predilection for 
exact statement. The impression he left 



234 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

upon his audience, however, was always 
powerful. Every one who heard him testifies 
that the man triumphed where the orator 
was most to seek. 

When he once became sufficiently at 
home with any one to conquer his natural 
reserve, he was excellent company, for he 
had a large fund of humour, and the gift of 
Teufelsdrockian laughter — *'a laugh of the 
whole man from heel to head." He was 
especially devoted to children. One of my 
correspondents remembers him most vividly 
with a child on each knee telling them Hon 
stories ; and another recalls his own boyhood, 
and days of sickness in bed brightened by a 
visit from Livingstone, who showed him the 
marks of the lion's teeth in his arm, and 
entertained him with some of his adventures. 
The atmosphere that he most detested was 
the atmosphere of flattery. There is a fine 
story about him which illustrates this. He 
had been invited out to dinner, and had 
fallen to the lot of a society lady who was 
injudicious enough to indulge in some very 
highly coloured compliments on his achieve- 



XI DR. LIVINGSTONE 235 

ments. Suddenly Livingstone left the table, 
and was afterwards discovered sitting in a 
room in the dark. He explained that he 
could not endure to be praised to his face, 
and that he would not sit and listen to it. 
One who knew him intimately told me of a 
lecture delivered in one of our great northern 
towns. Two local orators introduced the 
proceedings with speeches magnifying 
Livingstone's achievements. When he rose 
to his feet he had an overwhelming reception, 
but, turning straight to a large map, he said 
in a singularly cold, hard voice : "If you 
want to know the truth about the river 
system of Central Africa, be good enough to 
look at this map," and plunged into his 
subject without a word of reference to any- 
thing that had been said about himself. He 
was the least vain and most unspoiled of any 
man who was ever lionised by the British 
public ; the secret of which was undoubtedly 
to be found in the humility and sincerity of 
his Christian faith and character. 

Of that faith something ought to be said. 
In his earliest letters which have been 



236 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

preserved, we can see how strongly he was 
influenced by forms of theology that have 
long since ceased to be regarded as Scrip- 
tural. That the heathen who had never 
heard of Christ were perishing eternally 
was a doctrine that inspired much mission- 
ary devotion. These dogmas, it is clear, 
very gradually became impossible to him 
in view of the actual facts of the vast 
heathen world. But the supreme motive 
never changed. In a letter written just at 
the time of his ordination, he expresses his 
sense of the honour done to him in being 
accepted by Christ Jesus as one of His 
witnesses. The absolute surrender of his 
own will and mind to " his fair Captain 
Christ" was the fact most fundamental to 
Livingstones whole career. To the last, 
he never felt that he was really in the way 
of duty unless he was doing missionary 
work and bearing witness to the lordship 
of Christ. Stanley bore his testimony to 
the practical character of Livingstone's 
religion. ** In him religion exhibits its 
loveliest features ; it governs his conduct 



XI DR. LIVINGSTONE 237 

not only towards his servants, but towards 
the natives, the bigoted Mohammedans, 
and all who come in contact with him." 
In another striking phrase, he says : ** Re- 
ligion has tamed him and made him a 
Christian gentleman." Until his physical 
powers utterly failed, he never omitted to 
gather his men around him for evening 
service, read and pray with them, and add 
some simple exhortation. 

He was a man of deep convictions. Once 
thoroughly alive to some fact, he took a 
tenacious grip of It, and gave it a place in 
all his thinking. That was how it came 
to pass that neither the politicians nor the 
men of science could prevail upon him to 
leave the social sore of Africa to others and 
devote himself to exploration and discovery. 
Livingstone's Puritan soul, that knew how 
to put first things in the first place, realised 
that the fact of most moment in Africa was 
not the sources of the Nile, but the sources 
of the slave trade. This great social problem 
had to be attacked if religious and spiritual 
work was not to be negatived. Much 



238 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

might be written about his courage in 
alienating those who sympathised with his 
work as an explorer and those who might 
have assisted him financially. He knew 
quite well that a price must be paid by 
any one who was really in earnest to destroy 
the slave trade. But nothing moved him. 
Henceforth it was a case of ''this one thing 
I do." Perhaps the most remarkable fact 
of all is, how early in his life he perceived 
that here lay the path he was to tread. 
There lies before me as I write an old 
brown and much torn letter which must 
have been the first he wrote from the 
Cape on his arrival there, and is dated 
March lo, 1841. Every inch of the large 
sheet is covered with writing, and among 
the last words is a reference to the resist- 
ance of certain of the Boers to the policy 
of emancipation. Then follows this sen- 
tence : '' Oh ! when shall the time come 
in which every man that feels the heat of 
the sun shall be freed from all other fetters 
but bonds of love to our Saviour ! " So 
the young missionary wrote in his first 



XI DR. LIVINGSTONE 239 

letter from Africa ; so he prayed and strove 
for thirty laborious and weary years ; and 
so he prays still from his grave in the 
Abbey, and few will claim that that prayer 
has been vainly uttered in the ear of God 
and man. 

His unique influence over the natives of 
Africa is admitted. It may not be possible 
wholly to analyse his secret, for such words 
as '' personality '' and '' magnetism " are 
easily written, and do not help us very 
much. Two things we may say on this 
subject, and leave it. Firstly, he believed 
in them ; and secondly, he did not expect 
too much of them. This is no more than to 
say that he entered into his inheritance by 
means of the two ancient and Scriptural 
keys — faith and patience. He was abun- 
dantly rewarded for his faith. ** Any one," 
he said once, *'who lives long among them 
(^.^., the natives) forgets that they are black 
and remembers only that they are fellow- 
men." That was certainly all that he 
remembered. The stories of Sechele, Se- 
bituane, Sekeletu, and others would have 



240 DR. LIVINGSTONE chap. 

set the crown on his reputation were it n'ot 
that that was reserved for the heroic band 
who attended him on the last of his journeys, 
and made themselves an everlasting name 
by their final and supreme act of devotion. 
But, if he saw their splendid possibilities 
underneath all their degradation, he never 
expected too much of them. His scientific 
mind appreciated all that they owed to 
centuries of savagery and superstition. He 
was infinitely patient with them. He for- 
gave them until seventy times seven. He 
quietly and gently reasoned with them 
when any other white man would have lost 
his temper and resorted to force. He 
could hardly be persuaded even to punish 
the recreant with any severity. *' I have 
faults myself,'' he would say simply. 

The last word should concern his single- 
mindedness and disinterestedness. Neither 
as missionary nor as Government official is 
there any trail of commercialism over his life. 
When the bank in Bombay failed, with the 
money he had lodged in its keeping, it 



XI DR. LIVINGSTONE 241 

hardly cost him a pang. All his money was 
dedicated to the cause in which he gave his 
life, and his personal serenity was quite 
independent of possessions. He refused to 
bargain with the Government as to terms ; 
and when Lord Palmerston sent a friend to 
ask what he could do for him, Livingstone's 
whole ambitions were centred on an inter- 
national arrangement that would sanction the 
creation of settlements which could stand 
between the natives and the slavers. At no 
single period in his life is there any tittle of 
evidence that he cared for money save as it 
might advance the cause that was dearer to 
him than life itself. 

The world still argues and disputes as to 
what it is that constitutes the highest form of 
greatness. In the common acceptation of the 
term Livingstone was not a man of genius. 
He was not brilliant ; he was not strikingly 
original. What he achieved was done by 
the genius, falsely so called, of taking pains. 
But this we may surely say : If human 
greatness consists not in any natural endow- 



242 DR. LIVINGSTONE ch. xi 

ment alone, whether of the genius of 

those 

" Who seem not to compete nor strive, 
Yet with the foremost aye arrive " ; 

or the genius of industry in those who 
believe that ''it is dogged as does it"; but 
rather in all the powers and faculties of a 
man s nature brought into subjection to one 
supreme disinterested ambition for the glory 
of God and the good of man, then few 
greater men have ever walked this earth 
than David Livingstone. 




243 



INDEX 



AjAWA TRIBE, 123, 124 
Algoa Bay, arrival at, 21 
Amoda, 199, 205 
Arab slave encampments, 144 
Ascendancy over followers, 218 

Bakatlas, work among, 29 
Bakwains, 54 
Baldwin, Mr., 121 
Bambarre, 166, 168, 179 
Bangweolo, Lake, 129, 155-8, 209, 

221 
Barotse Valley, 73 ; orations at, 91 
Batoka tribe, 99 
Beehuanaland, 42 
Bemba, Lake, 129, 155 
Bennett, Mr. J. G., jnr., telegram 

to Stanley, 179 
Blantyre, 3 ; old mill ruins at, 13 
Boers, complicity of, with slave 

trade, 35 
Bombay, 130, 137, 138 
Breakdown on journey to coast, 222 
British Association, lecture to, on 

slavery, 133, 134 
Buga, 210 
Burrup, Mr., 125 
Burrup, Mrs., 124 
Bushmen, 44 

Caffre war, 51 

Cambridge University, address to, 

109 
Cameron, Lt., favours burying in 

African soil ; followers object, 224 
Cape Town, 66 
Carras, 220 



Carrying the body to the sea, 223 

Casembe, 154, 158 

Cecil, Rev. Richard, 17, 18, 28 

Chambeze River, 150, 155, 208, 209 

Chanda, 205 

Chanya Range, discovery of, 167 

Chawendes Villag^e, 222 

Chiboque, 79-81, 88 

Chisera, the, 153 

Chitambo, 215, 221 ; last arrival 

at, 219, 220 
Chitapangwa, chief, 1 50 
Chitimba, chief, 153 
Chobe River, 57 
Choma, the, 153 
Chonuane, 37, 38, 40 
Chowp«re, 217 
Christmas Day, Livingstone's last, 

203 
Chumah, 129, 139, 168,207,210,219 
Chungu, chief, causes delay in last 

journey, 204 
Clarendon, Lord, despatch to, 155 
Congo, 90, 141 

Damara Land, 42 

Davis, Jeff, 133 

Delagoa Bay, 42 

Dillon, Dr. , 224 ; suicide of, 225 

Dilolo, Lake, 90 

Dugumbe, 172-4 

East Coast under Portuguese 

authority, 132 
England, e7t route to, 130 

Far ij ALA, 205 ; makes post-mortem, 
220 



24s 



246 



INDEX 



Fastings and Vigils, Livingstone on, 
197 

Fergusson, Sir W., examines body, 
226 

Final illness begun, 209 

Forerunner^ loss of, with des- 
patches, %"] 

Freedom of Cities of Edinburgh and 
Glasgow, 106 

Frere, Sir Bartle, 138 

Gabriel, Mr., kindness of, 85 

Gardner, Mr., 199 

** Goat Island," 97 

Government officials, limitations of, 

131 
Gutzlaff, C, calls for medical mis- 
sionaries, 10 

Hamaydah, 190 
Helmore, Mr., 121 
Hogg, David, 19 
Hughes, Thomas, 17, 1 32 
Hunter, David, 3, 6 

Ilala, 129 

Inscription on grave, 227-8 

Johanna men, 146 
Journey to coast, 222 

Kalahari Desert, 27, 40, 42 

Kalongosi River, 159, 203 

Kasai, 90 

Kasekera, 225 

Katema, chief, 78 

Kirk, Dr., 120, 227 

Kizinga, 159 

Kolobeng, 38, 40, 45, 46 

Kuruman, 47, 113 

Kwihaha, 189 

Lacerda, Senhor, accuses Living- 
stone of robbing Portugal of her 
rights, 134 

Lake Nyassa 116, 129, 138 

Last birthday, 207 

Last journey begun, 200 



Last march, start of the, 140 

Leeambye, 61 

Letters that never reached the 
coast, 164 

Libonta, 91 

Liemba, Lake, 151, 155 

Limpopo River, 42 

Line of march of body to coast, 221 

Lintipe, the, 147 

Linyanti, 59, 60, 66, 69, 72, 88, 
91, 96, 115 

Livingstone, Charles, iii 

Livingstone, David, birth of, 2, 3 ; 
Blantyre home, 3 ; mother, 3-6 ; 
father, 3-4, death of, 5 ; religious 
difficulties, 7 ; boyhood, 9 ; as 
naturalist, 10; endurance and fear- 
lessness, II, 80, 89 ; employed in 
factory, 12-14 ; at Ongar, 13 ; at 
Glasgow University, 14 ; Licenti- 
ate of Faculty of Physicians and 
Surgeons, 19 ; ordination, 19 ; 
departure for S. Africa, 19 ; at 
Kuruman, 23-4, 33 ; contest 
with rainmakers, 26 ; at Mabotsa, 
29 ; attacked by lion, 30 ; mar- 
riage, 33 ; children of, 33 ; wife 
and children return jto England, 
39; astronomy student, 55 ; Dutch 
marauders seek vengeance on, 
56-8 ; object of suspicion at the 
Cape, 51 ; farewell to wife and 
children, 52 ; vows prevention of 
slave traffic, 55 ; researches into 
flora and fauna, 54-5 ; first taste 
of malaria, 60 ; medicine stolen, 
71 ; pleaches on journey 
up-country, 77 ; attacked by 
fever, 81 ; rewrites lost 
papers, 87 ; names the Victoria 
Falls, 97 ; carves initials on tree 
at Victoria Falls, 98 ; escapes 
shipwreck, 104 ; reaches Dover, 
104 ; back home, 106 ; Oxford 
and Cambridge degrees, 106 ; 
father's death, 106; receives 
medal of Roy. Geogr. Soc, 106 ; 
entertained by distinguished 



INDEX 



247 



people, 107 ; second illness, 162 ; 
eighty days prisoner in a hut, 
168 ; narrow escapes from death, 
176 ; down with dysentery, 204 ; 
his unconquerable hope, 212 ; last 
written words, 213 ; devotion of 
his followers, 213 ; last words, 

216 ; found dead on his knees, 

217 ; body dried in the sun, 
221 ; body handed over to the 
Consul at Bagamoio, 226 ; arrival 
of in England, 226 ; personal 
details, 229 et seq ; clear- 
ness of scientific observations, 
232 ; devotion to children, 234 ; 
dislike of compliments, 234-5 ; 
humility and sincerity, 235 ; first 
letter from Africa, 238 ; single- 
mindedness, 240 

Livingstone, Mrs., anxiety of, 106; 

left behind at Cape Town, 113; 

death of, 126 
Loanda, 72, 73, 87-8, loi, 131 
Loangwa River, 147-8 
Lobingela, 209 
Lofti River, 202 
London Hospitals, Livingstone's 

studies at, 197 
London Missionary Society, 15, 16, 

108 ; Livingstone's letter to, 51 ; 

sends mission to Linyanti, 121 
Lotembwa, 90 
Lualaba River, 155, 164, 166, 168, 

170, 172 
Luamo River, 166 
Luapula River, 221-2 

Mabotsa, 37 
Mabruki, 199 
Mackenzie, Bishop, 122, 124,1128, 

139 
Maclear, Sir Thomas, 55, 166 
Majwara, 214, 217 
Makololo, the, 49, 54, 59, 61 72, 

73, 118, 128 
Mamire, 95-6 
Manyuema, 164 
Matabele, 96 



Mataka's country, 144 

Matisa, deceit of, 207-8 

Mazitu, the, 152, 213 

Mbame village, 123 

Mburuma, chief, 10 1 

Meroe, Lake, 152-6, 170 

Mikindany Bay, 140 

Milk, vain efforts to obtain, in last 

illness, 213 
Misinje, the, 145 
Moffat, Dr., 10, 21-2, 64, 91, 

104, 113, 227 
Moffat, Mr. J., at Makololo, 108 
Moffat, Mrs., 10, 91, 113 
Mohamad Bogharib, 154, 157, 159, 

162, 168 
Molilamo, 213 
Monze, chief, IQO 
Moremi, 59 
Mpende, chief, 103 
Mtemese, guide, 76, 77 
Murchison Falls, 116 
Murchison, Sir Roderick, his theory 

confirmed by Livingstone; 90 
Murphy, Lieut., 224-5 
Murray, Mr., 43 

Nassick, 139 

New York Herald^ 179 ; articles 

for, 187 ; letter to, 193 
Ngami, Lake, 39, 45».54; Mrs. 

Livingstone first white lady to 

see, 46 
Nsama, chier, 153 
Nuanyasere, 217 
Nyangwe, 172 
Nyassa, Lake, 1 18, 142, 147, 151, 155 

On the last march, 211 
Orange River, 42 
Oswell, Mr., 43, 47, 49, 227 
Outrages on native tribes, 35 

Pall bearers, 227 

Palmerston, Lord, offers Consul- 
ship, 108 ; request from, 135 

Pearl at Zambesi, 114; Living- 
stone leaves for Africa on, 1 1 1 



248 



INDEX 



Philip, Dr., 25 

Pioneer to be handed back to 

Government, 128 
Portuguese half-caste slave owners, 

74 

QUILIMANE, 93, 103, 108 

Rhodesia, 96 

Robert, Livingstone's son, fights 
and dies in Federal ranks, 133 

Rovuma, arrival at mouth of the, 140 

Royal Geographical Society grants 
help, 136 

Ruse to get Livingstone's body 
through to the coast, 225 

Russell, Lord, recalls Bishop Mack- 
enzie, 128 

St. Paul de Loan da, 66 

Sambanza, orator, 75 

Sebituane, 45, 47, 48, 57, 60, 97, 

239 
Sechele, 26, 28, 35, 37, 45, 56, 239 ; 

baptism of, 42 
Sekeletu, 57, 59, 60-2, 70, 82, 92, 

94, 96, 98, 239 ; joy at Living- 

stone's return, 121 
Sekwebu, 103 ; death of, 104 
Sesheke, 49, 70 
Shinte, 74 et seq ; odd wardrobe of, 

75 
Shire, 1 17-9, 123, 135, 146 

Shongwe, 97 

Shupanga, 126 

Slave dealers follow Livingstone, 
120 

Slavery, fight against, by Living- 
stone, 127 

Slave trade, villainies of, 131 

Stanford Rivers, 17-8 

Stanley, H. M., meets Livingstone, 
178; arrival at Ujiji, 180; brings 
news of £\yOQO vote by Govern- 
ment, 182; Livingstone's story 
told to, 182 ; pictures Living- 
stone, 184 ; Livingstone's journal 
committed to, 187, precautions 



in sealing, 187 ; departure, 189 ; 
meets English relief expedition, 
192 ; first impressions, 230 e\ 
seq, ; on Livingstone's religion, 

236-7 
Steele, Col., 43 
Stewart, Dr., 124, 126 
Susi, 139, 168, 171, 177, 190, 

199, 205, 207, 215-6, 219, 222, 

224 

Tanganyika, Lake, 93, 147, 150, 
151, 158, 165, 183, 201, 222; 
Livingstone's illness at, 152 

Taylor, Dr. Isaac, 19, 23, 150 

Tette, 19, 103, 115, 122 

Tsetse fly, d^^ 93, 140, 142 

Ujiji, 156-9, 162-7, i74, ^11^ 212 
Universities' Mission, 122, 130, 145 
Unyanyembe, 180, 186, 191, 221, 
224 

Victoria Falls, 98, 121 

Wade Sale, 205 

Wainwright, Jacob, makes in- 
ventory, 219 ; reads burial service, 
220 ; carves Livingstone's name 
and date of death, 221 ; erects 
cross at place of death, 221 ; 
pall-bearer, 227 

Wardlaw, Dr., 15 

Webb, Mr., 134 

Webb, Mrs., 134 

Westminster Abbey, first visit to, 
17 ; body laid in, 226 

Young, Mr. James, 135 
Young, Mr. E. D. , starts for Africa 
in the Search^ 146 

Zalanyama range, 147 
Zambesi Falls, 97 

Zambesi River, 9, 49, 54) 61, 66, 
70, 93, 100, loi, 114, 116-7, 122, 

135. 141 
Zanzibar, 93, 167 
Zouga River, 43 7 



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